Age of Apocalypse: Shifting Times
by jenskott
Summary: In an alternative Age of Apocalypse WeaponX didn't rescue to Jean Grey from the pens. That simple fact changed the fate of many characters.
1. Double Face

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Age Of Apocalypse: Shifting Times

Author: Jenskott

Summary: What if had Weapon-X not rescued to Jean Grey out of the pens?

Rating: PG-13.

Disclaimer: Sadly They belong to Marvel Comics.

Feedback: To jorgisimox@hotmail.com. Very cherished and appreciated and beloved. However English isn't my native language, therefore forgive my very obvious mistakes. Still I'll thank polite advices.

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Part One. Double Face-

The vicious bone-crunching noise echoed across the narrow room.

Pietro reeled with the blow, and closed his eyes to numb the jarring pain. He'd have stumbled and fell down if strong and harsh arms hadn't held him still.

Slowly, the ache throbbing on his jaw dulled slightly, and his mouth got back the ability to feel. He moved it with difficulty, each muscle itching. It ought to be broken. A bitter taste with a hint of copper said him he had bit and his lips were bleeding. Perhaps the tongue too.

He half-lidded his eyes. God, even the faint light brought pain. He blinked, settling to the clarity, and aware of his bearings, sought to Ororo with his sight.

The ebony-skin white-haired goddess remained seized by her captors, the Bedlam brothers. Of course it'd be hard, though nice, that she ran away to somewhere else, preferably the X-Men HQ, or any place free of Apocalypse and his minions else.

His mind replayed the events of the last hours. The ambush were so easy and so obvious... So much they weren't deceived and walked in it knowing fully well the risks. Regrettably they were so confided, so damned sure with the fact of having spotted the snare, and so foolishly convinced of their skill to stomp on the trap and dodge the steel jaws in time...

They made it fine, but were so delighted and fond of their own conceit they wasted time and delayed too much, until a portal opened out of nowhere, flooding the place with Infinites. They could get away STILL, but chose to take them down. That wrong decission gave time to the reinforcements to arrive, surround the place, and storm inside. When turned to be painfully obvious they were outnumbered, barely might do an explosive breakdown in the siege, so Clarice teleported them away of there. He distracted to the troops with his super-speed, but he lost her focusing when Ororo was wounded. He was fired and badly injured, and Ororo faced the Infinites to save him, instead of running away.

Hence they were now in that plight.

In hands of an enemy who took pride in slaughter cruelty anyone quite silly to let itself get captured, and now had where he wanted to foes who took pride in being 'betrayers' and spoiling his crazy plans.

They had been took down, and swiftly moved at other place, the very Apocalypse stronghold while they were knocked out. He cursed to himself and scolded his arrogance and lacking of tactical-thinking, which had put in peril not only to him, but also to Ororo, more concerning in saving him than in staying alive. He'd bet she'd let to capture to help him to get away. That supposing they were able of managing it.

Right now they were in a severe room with walls ceiling and floor covered with metal layers. The walls were bare of any decoration, and the single furniture was a table and some chairs. Surely this was the room where the prisoners could be beaten in privacy, without anybody interfering with it. And they were in there, with the Bedlam brothers holding to Ororo, and the Guthrie siblings to him. Actually only the blonde giant was holding him, twisting his arms behind his back with crushing force. He was sure his bones were about of splitting. The Kentuckian brat was making sure of it with downright diligence.

He had been punched violently over and over, until his senses were dulled. He felt pain until beyond the point where you can't feel more. His powerful legs held him upright out of sheer will force, and he was thankful by his formidable musculature, since otherwise they'd be broken. He was sure at least one rib was broken, going along with his nose. His belly with the soft innards felt as a sponge.

Ororo was better, but no far better. They were venting their fury with him, the Magneto's son, before than the windrider. Due to that Ororo was quite winded and beaten, with a red cut leaking blood down one cheek, several bruises turning purple, and welts beneath the costume, marking her fair skin. Aurora and Northstar gripped tightly her upper and lower limbs, and she seemed drowsy, but even so she conserved her iron will, and kept her head high, denying to give them the satisfaction of bringing her down.

He saw her burning, defying eyes, and felt somewhat of her strength irradiated at him, invigorating him. Sudden warmth washed over him, and slowly the wounds, the blood and the hurt faded off his mind. Energy flooded his muscles, and he wrestled to stand up, proud and haughty. He did know Guthrie would just punch it using more strength, but didn't care for it.

Another fist smashed his head, brutally, crunching cartilage and cracking bone. His head jerked backwards, and a buzz ringed in his ears. He turned at him and smiled.

Guthrie squirmed, and Pietro might see him practically glowering with rage. He arched back a leg, probably to kick his groin, when the door slammed open with violence, rising a tiny dust cloud.

He stared at the newcomers. Wonderful, he pondered. Right when he was wondering whether they planned kill him on the spot or not, HE showed up.

Coal black skinsuit, fit tightly to the body. Heavy leather boots. Fingerless gloves of dark brown leather. Blonde hair, cropped short in military style. Face twisted in an inhuman snarling grimace. Eyes shining a razor sharp blue. However, barely saw spotted his beaten shape, they sparkled with glee, cruelty, and... Anticipation?

"Fine, fine. Seems at last our soldiers have demonstrated are capable of doing a simple thing well, and have brought here a traitor trash." Havok sneered evilly. He shoved brutally with an arm a female figure, roughly tied with thick ropes and gagged. The woman was impelled onwards with the strong momentum, and bumped in a table. The corner of the table stabbed her midsection, and she doubled over with a moan of pain. Her body slid downwards, unsteadily falling on her knees.

Pietro spotted purple hair, soft strands braided in a ponytail impeding them fall over the shoulders. It and the tight violet ninja garb were telltales of the woman in question.

Psylocke, one of the newest X-Men, and brother of the HC member, Brian Braddock.

Havok strode at the table, and pulled out a chair, kicking aside to Betsy as if she was piece of garbage. She rolled along the unforgiving and cold tiles, but to her credit, the woman didn't moan, or cry, or sob, or do anything, anything would give satisfaction to her enemy, the satisfaction of having raised a reaction. Only remained quiet and motionless. However, Pietro and Ororo could see her face, darkened with the long bangs shrouding her expression. And it burnt with indomitable fury smoldering on her eyes.

The Prelate ignored this, and seated down comfortably, folding his legs and threading his hands together.

"Greetings, my unexpected quest. Surely may I hope the service was of your liking?" his smile was infectious and oily. His teeth reminded to Pietro of a crocodile.

"No, it was quite lame. Though I'd not expect other thing of the Apocalypse whores." He stated diffidently.

Cracking of leather wrinkling sounded. Havok smiled no longer, and his fingers were clenching and unclenching with barely restrained fury. His eyes squinted and began to tinge with a dull golden glow. When spoke, his voice was colder than chunk of ice, harsh and emotionless. It gave goosebumps to the listeners.

"That's funny. You're a filthy betrayer to your race, and take pride in it. You're an active and unrepentant foe of my Lord. You're in my power. You extremely painful and unpleasant demise can give me the title of Horseman at last. I can kill you in the span of a second if I want, of thousand different ways. And you instead understanding your position, throw petty remarks and insults. The X-Men go crazy always whenever are captured?"

Pietro snorted derisively. "What were you looking forward to, exactly? See me frightened and crying, groveling beneath your feet and begging you don't kill me? You're dreaming awake, Summers. Your kin can laugh when they kill defenseless people, and get wet their pants when they're prisoners and without powers, but that isn't the X-Men style. If you planned see me crawl humiliated, I'm afraid I'm going to disappoint."

He huffed with finality, leering at Havok with endless contempt, and not ever altered his face when Guthrie backhanded him, rattling his teeth.

Ororo stared the scene unfolding, and took a choice. She couldn't allow Pietro was the single focus of his attention -or fury-. She reasoned they were to be kept alive until they got information. However, with the hot temper of the Prelate Summers, this one might just kill to Pietro and tear the information off her. If she could to distract him...

"Evidently, Quicksilver, the Prelate thinks everyone act like him. And if he's cocky and gloating with bounded prisoners, but whimpers and screams as a little girl when you beat up him in a bloody pulp, he'll think you're due to behave likewise. Do you remember Nebraska?"

"Impossible forget it" his eyes flashed with mirth while he stated gleefully that short sentence.

Both howled with laughter. Though a loud clatter echoed for above of their voices. Havok had sit up, throwing backwards the chair with the sudden and violent movement.

"Caged canaries squawking as eagles." He spat.

Wavering ripples of golden energy of plasma pulsated silently around his fists. These crackled with power pleading being unleashed. The very air screeched and moaned with the power gathering and building up. The glow was only dulled with the wildly flashing eyes of the Prelate. He was about of exploding in other of his savage, uncontrollable displays of rage. The hoarse growl going past his throat was molding in intelligible words.

"You are speaking too much, cretins. Do you want see a show of my authority? Perfect, I'll assure personally are going to suffer a full demonstration, with as many encores as you demanded. And after I'm done with both of you, anything left will be give to Dark Beast to play with or do away with, it won't mind while you squeal."

The amber glow intensified and increased, flashing with dazzling bolts. The energy circles widened and grew in size, and his form was concealed with the radiant light, brightest than a shining sun, enveloping him. Electricity crackled and coursed his body, ending on his fingertips. A shapeless curtain of bright-yellow power was given off by his body, releasing the explosive energy his human frame hardly could contain. The air grew hotter and weighed, thickened with pressure. Each step Havok gave left a footprint of molten metal, sizzling on the floor.

Pietro felt his heartbeats quickening up his pace. He was sweating, drops of glistening water prickling his skin and evaporating barely shed. His throat was dry and hot, as if his tongue was made of sandpaper, and he'd have swallowed a mouthful of dirt. His eyes were meeting difficulties to stay open and enduring the hot-melting, radiant glow, and the heat was giving him dizziness anyway.

He panted heavily, his lungs swallowing desperately air in hopes of getting moistness, and he wondered idly if Summers was planning melt him in a puddle on the spot itself. Or maybe evaporate the water off his entire body, and rendering him paper-dry as a wizened flower. The picture of his skin a sea of toasted wrinkles clinging on his slim body floated in his mind like a death vision.

His sight, clouded with a mist of vapor saw to Guthrie backing off, shivering in spite of the flaring heat, overwhelmed by a raw fear. Elisabeth Guthrie and the Bedlames weren't so lucky, and were being roasted joined to him and-

Ororo? How was Ororo? He shook his head and searched her frantically. She was upright still, but her head was slumped on her chest, waving at both sides, and she babbled in low voice. The warmth was dehydrating her. She lived in Egypt, Sudan and Serengeti, but Havok was turning that tiny chamber in the sun core.

Pietro steeled, denying to Havok the sight of him covering in fear, shuddering, or simply worried. Though his firm countenance was blurred with the intense light. It was spreading in lazy circles, licking the borders of the chamber, and switching its colors. From the radiant golden to amber to clear yellow and to bright white and to ivory purest than the snow finally.

Quicksilver started to think Summers was way gone off by now. If he released such energy, the area in a circle of dozens of meters of diameter would be blistered in a split-second, including the prisoners and the citadel. He swiftly looked for options, but he did know if his temper had blown up its top, he was far beyond of being reasonable.

Pietro pleaded inwardly by some last-second-possible rescue.

"What is going on here?" bellowed an imperious, hoarse voice.

The speedster mutant glanced quickly to the door, where a figure stood upright and with his arms folded. That person remained apparently oblivious to the excruciating heat burning the air and scorching the walls until the metal bubbled. Random tendrils of radiation brushed it and faded if touched the skin, and the air surrounding him was less charged with power, less warmer, and the light blinked off, giving him an halo-like aura of dimmed light which allowed make out the factions.

Pietro stared the tight blue costume of spandex and kevlar, the gloves and boots yellows, the severe, stern face, the square and unshaven chin, the long mane brown concealing the half of his face, and the visor concealing the eyesight with its red lenses, glinting sharply. He groaned.

No, please, that no. Anyone else, please he beseeched to nobody.

Summers barely spared at him a glance. "Stay out of my business, brother." He warned.

"_Your_ business?" the eldest Prelate repeated skeptically. "I'm in charge of the pens. Any new prisoner must be reported to me, mainly in case of rebels. And I don't recall have authorized to kill prisoners with important information only because you're pissed off, brother."

To Quicksilver was weird seeing the exchange. Cyclops was the very picture of the calm, the coldness, and the self-control. His face was an emotionless mask, unyielding and stern, looking down his brother without giving away anything. However Havok was bold, rush, thoughtless, furious and uncontrollable. His face was perpetually snarling to his brother.

Havok blacked out abruptly his energy building, displaying an impressive control, and strode angrily as far as one centimeter in front of Cyclops. His fists were clenched still, and seemed be pleading for Summers giving one, ONE, motive to punch his face.

"Listen me well, brother" he roared "I know make my work, and I'll not bear to rebels who don't know their places, or brats who waste the time being pampered by everyone and getting in the way!"

"Ironical you say that, boy. Scott is six years older than you." Stated a voice from the threshold. It was female, serene, analytical with a hint of scorn and sarcasm, and sounded too painfully familiar to both rebels.

The blonde Prelate sidestepped his brother, ignoring him now completely.

"Shut up your filthy mouth, you bi--"

Suddenly, his voice emitted a strangled sound, and his eyes widened impossibly, bulging out of their sockets. He held his throat with the hands and gasped helpless and needing air. The lacking of oxygen shoved him on his knees. He wobbled, and with a final jerk, crumbled aside, sprawled on the floor.

He gurgled incoherently when of sudden air returned to fill his lungs. He gulped it anxiously, heaving heavily, with loud intakes.

"Watch it, Alex. The last person speaking to me like that belched his innards." The voice in the door echoed with frosty voice. It sounded indifferent, like if its statement was a comment about the weather.

Inside of the room walked proud and haughty a woman. Clad in black and blue, a tight suit fitting her slender body, and wearing her blood-red locks cut in shoulder-length, a triangular tattoo marked her face, very mesmerizing but otherwise impassive.

She wandered over the hunched body of Summers, absolutely furious but unable of making something about it, and she looked him down, infinite disdain twisting her face.

"You are really a fool, Alex. A stupid, dumb, overestimated fool. Beyond remission and way beyond of understanding. You behave with deliberate and extreme cruelty and blood-thirst to appeal to Sinister and he likes more you instead, but your only gain is his spite and his lectures. You are a brat, Alex, a brat with too might for your own good, and the saddest bit is you're the only who don't see it or don't want to see. Perfect. Go on."

She kicked playfully his side, and gave him the cold shoulder.

"Don't even try and insulting me or plotting behind my back, Havok. Happens I know who you meet with every night in Heaven, I and everyone in fact, and may slip it out in my dream."

Alex didn't allow his inner flinch was seen outwardly, but his blanched face was perfectly clear. He knew perfectly what she was talking about. She had told him one day she was aware his romance with a flatscan, and when he wanted to deny it, couldn't. Couldn't talk, think, access to his power, and hardly breath. Then his mind replayed the scene of the night before, and his lips uttered the Scarlet name with the sound of climaxing in orgasmic pleasure.

The woman declared then she hoped this proved who was in control there, and warned Apocalypse would be aware too of his 'indiscretion' if he tried to mess with her or Summers, or did so much as think dismissively from them. She was blackmailing him unashamedly, rendering him powerless, and he knew. Though he couldn't retaliate. He suspected she had an affair with his brother, but they had never been caught, and might turn out she was merely using him. Other than it couldn't care less to anyone, Sinister included. Existed the possibility of blackmailing to Scott using her, but she had looked after of it, blackmailing him first.

That didn't stop him however to keep on hating his brother for snatching away all what he deserved, obtaining fame, power and position, throwing to him the crumbs he rejected. And now also that woman who suddenly had turned in his apparent protector and guardian, whether it was by egoist interest or by other reasons. The same woman he craved for destroying, and who right now was hurling glares at the prisoners. He watched vigilantly, focusing his brain in the scene, ready to discover any glimpse of affect or possible hint of treason. If was in connivance with the rebels, he'd know...

Pietro was boring his loath-filled eyes in her, burning with fierceness, while Ororo, the passionate and bold X-Woman was giving her longing, regretful looks. "Jean..." she whispered.

A brutal momentum, a fist of air, blasted to Storm against the wall, the sheer blow denting the metal and splitting cracks in the cement below it. The weather mistress moaned feeling her bones rattling, and fainted, albeit a light went off in her eyes before shutting them. Still the Bedlams were behind her and had absorbed the bigger part of the impact, sliding downwards in two limped heaps.

Guthrie sucked her breath and stepped backwards, the only reason he hadn't covered in fear for was retain a last grip on his dignity. Scott merely stared speechless, the Kentuckian giant gaped, and Pietro screamed, frightened.

"Don't talk me as if we were friends, Storm." Jean sneered angrily.

Or maybe not Havok thought, reconsidering his strategy. He regarded the fallen bodies under the neon light, and hurled a glare at Jean. "Look what you actions have caused. Now those two useless are out!"

She spun around glowing in anger. "And your actions were about of blowing up the citadel, Alex. Don't be a smart-ass." She looked over the bodies and shrugged. "Drag to Aurora and Northstar to the lab to heal them. With luck, Dark Beast will fix their brains up. I mean, they can't possibly get worst, can they?"

He blinked. That sounded ruthless even to him. Because his brother, a compassionate fool was with her was beyond his understanding.

"Your... back-stabbing, double-crosser traitor..." trailed off Pietro, still focused in the brutalized heap of Ororo. He was breathing raggedly, with difficulty; something weighed seated on his chest as a rock. He willed go to check on her and wake up her and hug her, but was efficiently and surely restrained.

Jean whipped her head, glaring him. She stepped forward, and slapped him. Hard.

"YOU betrayed to ME, quicksilver. YOU let they captured me during the assault, you ran away leaving me behind, and YOU never came to my rescue. I was left alone to fend off by myself, and did what I had to do to survive. So don't dare to judge me." She roared. Pietro gulped saliva, unable of retaliating or deny that.

They had left her, true. But that nearly had torn apart the team. Weapon-X menaced with kill to Magnus for giving up her first and impeding him to rescue her after. Rogue had been inconsolable, Ororo wept every night for weeks, and many were distraught. After, when they could attack all together, she was siding with Apocalypse. That defection was very hard, Logan and Gambit began to question his father's leadership, and other whispered about that, but the team held together finally. Excluding the Gambit desertion, which was for an entirely different issue.

She studied his face, and then continued, calmer, but just so harsh and cold. "You believe to yourselves better than Apocalypse, but to save your butts sacrifice to anyone, partners included, if you survive so. Apocalypse is honest about it, at least."

"Jean, that isn't right! We-" he yelled, wanting to explain her the reasons, the motives, the outcome her capture had got in the team, the suffering her friends and her lover had gone through, although part of him wondered if they wouldn't ring empty to her...

"Don't say it. Whatever it is. Meaningless gusts of hot air where I stand from." she cut, perhaps reading partially his mind. He shut up, but was sure if he might explain her, and she listened...

"If you weren't so stubborn fools, would follow after my example. The Magneto ideals haven't stopped to Apocalypse. Nothing did it. Magnus not ever could impede he take over the half the world, what are you that confided for in he'll accomplish the dream of that dead man? The Magneto's dream failed, the good intentions failed. Humans and mutants fight with each other, and when can, kill among themselves. It's time for giving up the utopia and living in the reality. I did. Can you do it?"

His answer was fast and quick even for him. "NO!"

Jean was about of saying some else, when Cyclops got between both. "It's enough with this nonsense. Guthrie, you and your sister lead them to one cell and lock in to the three."

"But-"

"Silence!" he bellowed "They are so beaten wouldn't survive to the interrogatory the time enough to answer one single question, least reveal the full information. So follow my orders and shut up."

Sam spun around in time to hide his assassin, resentful glare, and hoisted to Storm, handing over to his sister. She grew in size to grab to Pietro under an arm and bear to Storm heaving her over her shoulder. Meanwhile Sam took to Psylocke, and dragged her roughly along the floor.

"By the way." The prelate added off-hand. "Limit yourselves to obey my orders. I'm fed-up of punishing your transgressions because you ignore which is your duty and are always over-exceeding."

The tone was low and unreadable, but the menace underlying was unmistakable. With a growl the brothers left the chamber with their cargoes. Alex straightened, feeling the lecture was directed also at him.

"I know which is my job and how make it, brother." He growled.

"It's curious, you have never proved that to anyone, brother. Never. Among other things because you're eternally protesting when I want you do the job you claim to know make. Speaking of which, I wait a full report in my table in hour and one half. You DO write the reports, don't you?"

"YES. I DO" He seethed.

"Wonderful."

Without other word, Scott got out. Jean followed after him, silent and close as a shadow.

Havok remained motionless for seconds, basking in his fury, letting it fuel him, rejecting to cool down. Then he flashed with white, and his fist released a stray plasma bolt, drilling a hole on a wall. A puddle of molten metal slid downwards, hissing and steaming.

Havok spared a swift glance to the two siblings slumped and stirring with agony, and stomped out angrily. He couldn't care less for them.

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The rubble of the floor sensed hard on his face.

In another time he'd blink to clean the dust out his eyes, close the mouth to taste less rocks, turned his body to be not sedated on sharp pebbles. But no now. It wouldn't be of use.

He was a hollow shell of skin clung to dry bones, a limp heap barely alive crawling on the tough, stony ground, one more of the many moaning, whimpering, sick, weak, starving prisoners lurching on the floor and lying in thousand positions of self-abandon. His tongue hurt and his throat was dry as sand. He wondered sometimes when was the last time he tried water. His muscles were flaccid and thin, due to the undernourishment and the frequent beatings. A red haze floated in his brain dulling his reflects and sapping his strengths, erasing even the idea of escaping.

The fatalism took over him. What escape for? Only would be caught again, and beaten again, and thrown in the pens again, where he would agonize again. He'd be awoken, and remember he was starving, and thirsty, and tired, and wounded, and bleeding, and caged, since long ago, and above all he couldn't run away. No, was better surrender to all, sleep, sleep, sleep, a dream without dreams, ignore the world, ignore who was him, ignore all, forget, forget, forget.

The strong neon light however needled his eyes with pain, and the overwhelming reek stunk his nostrils, avoiding he sank into the blessing oblivion, the murky, glossy darkness his body was begging. It interfered with the suggestion polluting his brain. Even with splint bones, pummeled muscles and flayed skin, even with the death stalking in shape of hunger, thirst, pain, fear, Pietro Lensheer was too stubborn to surrender.

He rolled wearily over the hard, unforgiving ground. Still that easy chore let him breathing hard, and with his entire musculature screaming and moaning. Red spots danced on his eyesight, and a headache buzzed and pounded in his skull. His tongue tasted a bitter liquid. He had to have bitten a lip. Oh, well, it was refreshing.

Ignoring his joints snapping, he crawled over the stinking floor, dodging the living cadavers howling under him, and the monitors sending pictures above him. He shook his head and went on doing his way bit to bit, scratching the floor to hold and slicing his fingers in the process, stopping for nothing or nobody until reaching his goal.

The grey ivory Ororo's hair was matted with blood, and she was too tired and sleepy to open her mesmerizing, pupils-void, white eyes, but otherwise she was fine. He touched her temples. Hot. Feverish.

"She isn't hallucinating yet, I assure you, but her resistance is very worn off. I don't know how much we can bear this."

He rubbed her eyes so the dark blur condensed in a shape. It was Psylocke, her face tissue nearly so purple as her hair, swollen with bruises and crisscrossed with wounds, but she seemed definitively better than he did. Pietro wondered why.

However, that was a secondary matter, registered and kept on the back of his mind, always too hasty and fast to focus in something but the here and now. And now he wanted give her some hope to get out of here. But he had got no one to give her. He wasn't sure himself of their odds. He couldn't give consolation either. Not even a bad advice.

He glanced at passing the figure hunched underneath Psylocke. Surprise hued his expression seeing the green-haired, red-clad woman. It was that poor, lunatic woman who believed herself his sister, his father's daughter, and who his stepmother had absorbed long ago. He didn't recall her name.

"Do you know how we go out of here?" the ninja questioned evenly.

Despair gripped his heart and twisted on his chest. His eyes stung, but no tears were spilled. He had run out of supply long ago.

"No. I don't." He mumbled regretfully, his voice barely louder than a low whisper, black with hopelessness, cracked with grief. He lie the blame on him, the whole guilt was his, he leaded them to the trap, he should can protect them, but had failed, failed miserably, poor excuse of leader...

"Perhaps I can help." Stated a silent voice. It was low and flat, but its words stood out over the deaf mumble of the prisoners.

Psylocke raised up her head, and Quicksilver whirled as fast as his hips, energies and remainder speed allowed him. Which turned to be a lot.

One tall figure was standing upright above the rows of fallen heaps and rotten corpses, a lime green cloak enveloping a slim body, its open front billowing with every of her motions to show a red-and-yellow spandex hugging her female body. An ample cowl shrouded in dim darkness her face and factions, and only a stray red lock of hair fell out the shadows.

Pietro was speechless. He wasn't sure why, but the woman standing in front of them was remembering him of his dead sister, Wanda.

He was going to open the mouth when a lean finger touched his lips closing them. In the proximity he saw two specks of flaring green in the middle of the blackness.

"Silence" She hushed. "You and Betsy carry to Ororo and Lorna and follow me. I'll get out of here to all of you."

"What must we trust in you for?" he whispered.

"I'll explain to its due time. This isn't it. I'm in peril here, and each second counts." She answered.

Pietro wasn't fully sure of the validity of her reasons, but after few seconds -his brain could analyze and argue the pros and cons of a matter in less time, but with the drugs laced in the food and the telepathy disrupting his brain that was the best he was capable of-, he chose against turning down the offer. After all, what had he to lose? If this was a trap, they'd deal with it -foreboding thought-. If this was real, they had a chance of running away. If they were captured again, they wouldn't worse than now. And if they were got killed, in this situation death was liberation.

He glanced at Psylocke, and she agreed with a quiet nod, straightening to the woman. He cradled to Ororo and lifted her up, holding her in arms.

"All right, woman. We heed you lead, by now. But I swear" his voice steeled. Steeled? He was inwardly shocked. Where did the resolution come from? "If this is a trap, you demise will be long before than ours, and for my own hand."

She nodded but didn't dignify him with an answer. The hooded person simply spun around, slight and shadow-like, and moved away of them, beckoning them with a hand. Pietro and Psylocke exchanged swift glances, and went after.

Her feet did a nonexistent noise while she advanced slowly, avoiding step on the prisoners, and marking an erratic trail. Or might seem erratic, when she swayed and bend her body, zigzagged in the middle of the jail, sidestepped an empty spot, of walked ducking. But Pietro saw her motions were too forced, too well studied to be erratic, too fluid and easy. She was dodging something...

Realization dawned in him. The security monitors. He and her partners focused in repeating her movements and going after her way.

The trail wasn't easy yet. The poor captives rolled or stirred, and they had to sidestep, or nudge them to move. Psylocke pretended be a Prelate, and ordered them move away. Pietro shivered seeing her using that mean trick with mechanical coldness, but he didn't argue. Once in a while, someone noticed they were trying and doing, and stretched his or her arm in plead. And he looked away and forced to himself to ignore it, although felt something twisting on his belly each time it occurred. Under his viewpoint he wasn't being better than the ninja, but what was the other alternative there?

The mysterious woman leaned her frame next to the exit, drawing the folds of the cloak in her, and sneaked a hand to type the electronic lock. The door hummed silently, and opened with a screeching sound. She peeked out, looking around to spot guards. They waited apprehensively.

At last the woman turned at them with a nod. "The coast is clear." She whispered, and sneaked out with a flap of the cloak, as a wraith. Perhaps she was.

The two X-Men braced for anything, and darted outwards, clutching their weakened partners. The woman was leaning on the wall, folded arms below the cloak when they ran out. Without hoping for them, she closed again the sliding door, sealing the people inside.

"It hurts me let them inside." Pietro mumbled. "It seems selfish, free to the four of us and leave behind several dozens." Not well he'd emerged out the cell, his mind was less clouded, and his rational process were easier, less numbed.

"We have no choice." She stated matter-of-factly from the depths of her hood. "You've got other mission. Free them is the mine."

She did other gesture, and bolted down the gateway. They sprinted after her.

The quintet ran along narrow and winding passages, leaving behind cells after cells, every loaded with miserable, dirty and sick prisoners. Occasionally they stopped to dodge a patrol, or went back to hid behind some tower or in a murky dead end.

Thus the awesome and malignant majesty of the pens unfolded ahead of them with all his perverse glory. And Pietro was overwhelmed and sickened by it.

It was only a portion from his viewpoint, but boxes and boxes crowded with moaning and tattered shades, blinded with red lights spread at all directions, joined through platforms. Massive wires were hooked to the cells, machines and generators, and streamed upwards, straight as pillars or winding as monstrous snakes, covering the walls and columns of the dome as a techno-organic, gigantic, misshapen climbing plant, a sea of hanging weeds that cloaked and stole the bright sunlight. And far away, in the middle of the super-structure was outlined the looming base of the central Tower, climbing upwards with pride, and spearing the sky.

And in the pits of pens, the low, unceasing, relentless mumble that were the screams and moans of the humans and lesser mutants caged, remained everlasting, spreading as a tide.

"This... monstrosity." Choked Pietro, shivering with chilliness was no due to the cold. Unmentionable daily horrors floated in his frightened mind, and he wondered if this was what got mad to Jean.

Her guide stopped, and gave him a strange, private smile.

"We've reached the place." She spoke, and lowered slowly, dusting off a layer on the ground. Her fingers poked in one dented corner, and she used the leverage to pry it off.

The metal tile was lifted, and Pietro saw a stinky, shady subway spreading beneath them. A strong reek of wetness, murkiness and rottenness filled his nostrils with its repugnant scent.

"These are the lower levels. It's a maze of forgotten subways and old sewers. This is a kingdom of rats, and worst vermin. Few ones are enough bold, brave or fool to descent. Even the Infinites are too scared for going down, and only the Elite chase and hunt down prisoners. Of course this is our major drawback."

Her voice filled with some weird in there. Warmth and hope. Pietro realized then that it was rich and nice, filled with love and mercy.

She beckoned them to go. Pietro pushed to Betsy, who landed gracefully even wearing a burden, and he fell down after. The guide leapt diffidently in the sewer, and shut the makeshift hatch behind her.

She landed with a splash on a puddle of viscous water, tendrils of liquid leaking through cracks on the rocks, and flowing in a pothole. She rubbed in annoy her boots against a dry patch of the floor, amidst the several puddles of thick water spotted the place, born of liquid trickling out of the pipes, or sliding down the walls. Quicksilver noted, however, she seemed being soiling them with dirt instead.

A refreshing gust of wind streamed along the tunnels, making a hissing noise. Quicksilver sighed in relief, and Psylocke released to the green-haired woman, letting her down to see if she could stand. She stumbled and tripped, but before she fell down, Psylocke picked her up. She denied with the head, thought, and shook her head to get ride from the dizziness. Then she parted away from Psylocke, and struggled to remain on her feet. She wobbled, but achieved stay upright. Her legs shivered as jelly, but she looked ostensibly better.

She supported her weight on a wall and rubbed her face. "Here. Now I'm better. If I can't run, only would be a nuisance for you."

Pietro was aghast. "Don't be silly, Miss..."

"Dane. Lorna Dane."

"Dane, if you can't walk, one of us will carry you. We shan't leave here to someone if we can help it." He assured sternly, flinching nonetheless with the Jean's memory. In spite of that, part of him was gladder. If Miss Dane was recovering her bearings and understanding the situation, then her psychological state was getting better.

Her enigmatic savior strode at her and hugged her warmly, patting her back. Then she looked at them.

"You feel better because the Brain Consortium can't play with your minds down here. They are six brains of telepaths who sedate psychically to the prisoners to eradicate even the very idea of an evasion or breakout. But the aren't in charge of scan the tunnels to discourage fugitives as ourselves. But I don't rely entirely on it anyway. Excessive confidence is dangerous." She stated warningly.

Pietro took her advice at heart, that unknown woman troubling her already. "Too true. Who are you and what did you save us for?"

As if in clue, Ororo, free of the hallucinations of her self trapped down tons of debris and surrounded by corpses, chose to stir up and moan. Pietro averted her attention to her, stroking softly her temple and silvery hair.

"Easy, Ororo. We're out of the pens... Well, almost. You're safe." He cradled her soothingly, brushing her lids with care, all the time while she slowly opened them, letting the tiny illumination of the subway touched her pupils.

She blinked and shook her head to get used to the light in that zone, when she randomly spotted to the figure shrouded in the darkness of her cowl. She spotted sparkling green eyes and red hair.

"Jean?" she yelped hesitantly, although she would always recognize to her former best friend.

"Jean?" screamed Pietro shocked.

"Jean?" screeched maddeningly Psylocke, getting her guard high instantly. Twin purple blazes erupted out her fists and condensed in dagger-like blades.

"Jean?" mused Lorna dumbfounded, peering at her dubiously, not understanding whatever was happening, but alert and ready only in case.

Before Quicksilver got to Ororo down and bolted running, Storm summoned the elements, and Psylocke jumped brandishing her psychic weapons, a rosy light enveloped them, tying them and restraining them surely.

"Calm down." she said with neutral voice. "I'm not your adversary. I'm on your side."

"So? You were very busy showing the opposite thing weeks ago!" snarled Pietro, frustrated with the psychic bounds halting him airborne.

"You've been down here less than a week, only. Do you think truthfully can pass a month without you visiting the Interrogatory Room?" she stated disdainfully, combing her curls on her shoulder. "Besides, If I display a tiny bit of sympathy regarding to you, I'd dead. No, I'm sorry, I'd be beheaded, disemboweled and artistically maimed, and my chopped limbs would be stored in jars afterwards. And you'd remain in the pits."

She was using with him the voice tone plenty people used with little children to explain some obvious but they were too naive and ignorant to grasp. Pietro hated that tone, but there was something in her words giving a new light on the matter, a possibility unfolding he wasn't sure of wishing believing in. It would be too good.

"How can we know we can trust in you?" he wondered firmly, taking care in keeping the uncertain out of his voice.

With a wave of her hand, the rose tendrils seizing up safety to Psylocke dissolved in nothingness. The ninja, suspended middle-air, landed crouched.

Jean stared at her. "Read my mind. And fast, before other telepath can find me."

Next she took down her shields, allowing her inside. Psylocke brushed briefly the edges, fascinated with her power, an unbelievable might restrained, unexplored and unknown even for that woman, who could easily throw her out of her mind if she wished so. Though, Jean was allowing her a probe.

Psylocke submerged into her head and went out a second later, letting to Jean to rose her barriers up again.

She... She's telling the truth Psylocke broadcast telepathically. Jean observed thankful she'd realized the seriousness and dangers in her situation. She's stood here to free prisoners

Ororo disengaged away from Pietro, and landed to sprint towards Jean and embrace her warmly. The redhead wrapped her arms around her, returning joyous the hug.

"J-"

Don't spell that name she warned sternly. It was quite bad actually when the four of you named me. There's no cameras or microphones down here, but I'm not taking chances

Ororo nodded, her backhand cleaning the wet trails on her pretty ebony face. Of course. Oh, my dearest friend, I'm so very sorry having doubted of you. Beg you forgiveness

Jean patted her. Please, Ro, that was the idea. If you didn't buy my act, the Prelates would have find out about me long ago, and I'd get killed

Nevertheless, I'm sorry

The remainder three approached slowly. Pietro was beaming with pride at her, and Psylocke had got another expression, growing respect in it by Jean. Lorna was dizzy still, but understood and valued her sacrifice.

I'm sorry for having thought, even for a moment-

"Pietro" she cut off bothered "we have gone through it already. Now we're moving us, or guess who will be hunting down our hides. And I can positively assure he won't be secretly nice."

He nodded. The suggestion was wearing off fully, and he was returning to his former, rushed self. The interval was getting him nervous, and the pause itching along his legs. He needed move.

"Let's go." She mumbled, and jogged off, her cloak trailing behind her and flapping as a ghost. The three X-Men and Lorna followed her running, and when they had reached her, she sprinted. Thankfully they kept up, even Lorna.

It's dangerous if a telepath read my mind. Thankfully there's no telepaths among the Prelates and I don't know to anyone mightiest than me, other than Shadow King. And Apocalypse exterminated the psychics, so there's no a lot of us to start with. For once, one of his stupidities worked in our advantage

The entire bunch nodded. Do you know the Prelates we may run into as we run away? Psylocke wondered, seeking retrieving information as a good warrior, and letting Pietro and Ororo 'listen' it.

She nodded. Unfortunately is likely than the Guthries, since is their sector and their shift, but Havok can have switched the shifts without Scott knowing of it. The better had been to act in another hour, or in an area patrolled by Scott or myself, but we were risking us enough to be exposed. It's better the danger of a battle now

Pietro blinked. He searched in his memory who Scott could be and where he'd heard the name. And then he remembered to Jean naming to the High Prelate in the room. Her words were registered with their full implications in his head. Wait a moment! Do you mean the Prelate Summers is working with you?

She glanced at him with a strange expression, and sent her answer leading it to all. No, Pietro. I am working WITH HIM

Astonishment invaded the group. However, before anybody spoke or though something, Jean took an ounce of her power and hurled it in their brains as a spear. It coursed throughout their heads as a lightning, and a scene was replayed into their minds.

*********************************************************************************

She was checking the library, looking for some book worthy of her time, when a ruckus echoed from the living room. Her curiosity picked, and a bad foreboding driving her, she rushed out to investigate. She was frequently lonely these days. The Prelate stopped little time in there of late, and he usually slipped out of the room during the nights, when he believed she was sleeping. Besides, he'd turned more close-mouthed and elusive than usual.

The quarters of the Prelate Cyclops had been her cage since the goddamned day of her capture. She did know it might be worse -actually much worse-, but it did nothing to take away the obviousness of she was trapped inside with a demon. And still, Summers didn't seem so bad and abhorrent as the rest, his brother and Dark Beast for example. Scratch that, he WASN'T as bad as they were, no for a long shot. Actually there was something different in him, she couldn't put the finger on...

And he had been of late more... distant. More introvert, less talkative. She couldn't bait him in arguing so easily. And sometimes she surprised him giving a secret, longing glance, almost wishful. But what was he wishing for? And above all she read in his ever-shielded eyes guilt. A big, massive guilt, awful blame, massive sorrow, crawling into him and stabbing gleefully his entrails, weighing him down so much he walked downcast constantly, except when he was controlling to the Prelates. And they were a mob definitively needed of control.

She stopped ahead of the living room's door, unlocked and half-opened. Through the slit, yellow light and scathing voices filtered. She peeked.

The Prelate Summers was standing with the folded arms facing his little brother. Flanking his sides were the Guthries and the Bedlams, and behind them, observing the scene, was Sinister. His pale face was an unreadable mask, and he poised as a silent hawk.

Havok was smiling sardonically and pointing at his brother. Hollow eyes of icy-blue color accusing. Demanding. Calling him... traitor?

As in a court, Havok recounted his accusations to his brother. Accusations of being responsible of many evasions. Of him having betrayed to Apocalypse. Of him having rebelled. Grave charges that could get his brother killed, and he enunciated with a glutton, sick grin, eagerness written over his face.

Meanwhile, his squad moved silently, stealthily at Cyclops. This one remained motionless, unyielding, enduring stoically the accusation without quivering a brow ever. The only emotion his visor wasn't concealing was his contempt.

Then, a red blur leapt forward, a spike of sharp fear stabbing her heart as ice. She pushed it aside.

"He wasn't! I did it!" Jean shouted.

The entire assembly whirled towards her, shocked with that revelation. And no all of them had the same motives.

Havok barked an incoherent profanity, and Jean smirked -much to her own surprise- and using the little she had listened, crumbled the Havok theory with a make-shift history. She was risking much, but she made up an explanation about how that task might accomplish it just a telekinetic such like her. Full knowing her cooked-up tale could be taken apart easily, she claimed she had acted knowing the Prelate was in other place that night, therefore getting her hands free.

Surprisingly Sinister, of all people, had supported her confession saying it seemed likely and classed to him as reasonable. Still was obvious he wasn't buying it fully, so she threw her trump card.

Jean gloated saying didn't take much to trick to the Prelate because he was so driven in hating to his brother he used any given excuse to throw him to the dogs. She knew it wasn't a very smart idea, but during the little time she had known to the Prelate Havok, she had seen if he was angry, let his fury cloud his judgment wholly. Hence, he wouldn't question his alibi.

It worked. With a yell of 'filthy whore', he strode swiftly at her, and backhanded her with his fist brutally. Jean felt the sickening sound of bones crunching, and was hurled to the unforgiving floor. Her ears were ringing still with the brutal blow when she felt thick fingers grasp her throat and lift her. The Prelate held her body level-eye, and arched back a fist to smash her face.

A strong darted, griping Havok when was about of connecting, and with an unheard force snapped it backwards, and twisted it.

Havok howled in pain, and glared at his brother. The sinister light on his eyes didn't hide the tears.

"What the fuck are you doing, brother? Have you gone mad?"

And his violent, harsh tone didn't mask the gasps of hurt.

"Let her go." Cyclops grated in a slow whisper, dangerous whisper.

"You-" he argued. Stupidly.

"NOW!" he boomed.

A split-second later, Havok crashed against the wall, making it to tremble with the hit, and Cyclops was holding to Jean with his hand.

Havok shook his head, struggling for regaining his bearings. His skull throbbed with waves of pain, and he'd swear it quaked and ringed with the hit. His nose was a bloody mess of cartilage broken and glued against a cheek, oozing red blood. He leaned onward with a whimpering moan, but he was satisfied enough his back wasn't broken of.

Piercing light harmed his eyes until a shadow got in the way, looming him. Cyclops had stomped as far as his knocked down body, and now tapped impatiently the floor. Jean might see he was in a rage, but it was an emotion carefully controlled and tightly caged. It did most threatening and dangerous.

She also glanced at the four Havok goons tense and prepare to lunge to Scott, but Sinister halted them with a simple cough. Her intuition was telling her they couldn't care less to Cyclops.

He growled at Alex. "I'll deal with her."

"What?" his brother yelled, and winced. Scream wasn't a good idea when a headache was pounding on your brains.

"You've heard me. I'll see personally she receives her punishment."

"With what right?" seethed Havok, less aloud than usual. All in all he got retentive memory.

Cyclops grabbed him roughly and heaved him. The red glass sparked and shone with far brightness than Jean had seen ever, and wisps of red blazes were pouring out. The optic power behind the visor had to be building up.

"Point One: You are the Security Chief, and you have allowed a breakout!" he roared loudly. "Point Two: You have just accused your upper official of treachery. Point Three: Only for getting a raise you've interfered in an ongoing investigation, and let your petty jealousy allow to the guilty to get away with it. Point Three: I'm getting mightily sick of your petty jealousy and your inferiority complex, and besides it's getting in the way of your work. And Point Four" his chest heaved, raised, and lowered "She's incriminated to me, so I'm the fittest to decide his punishment."

A disturbing grin tugged upwards his lips, twisting them in something ugly.

Suddenly Sinister placed a hand on the Cyclops shoulder, and gave him permission. Scott nodded to Sinister, and Jean listened clearly his words.

"Evidently she hasn't learned yet which is his place here, Father. Trust me in this, I'll assure me of she knows it from now." He leered at her, cracking his knuckles. She shivered unwillingly, suddenly insecure and less adamantine than before.

The next minutes were a blur, facts happening so quick she remembered very little of. She noticed barely he dismissed to his subordinates and Sinister and he said good-bye at each other. He shut the door with a heavy sigh, and hurling a glance at her, grabbed her arm and dragged her roughly towards his bedroom, sitting her down on the bed. He closed the door and drew the drapes, and sighed again. Sparing another swift look, he took a chair, and placing it facing her, crumbled on it.

The muffled noise of his body resting on the cushion and the carved wood of the back was the last sound in several minutes.

"Why did you do that?" he stated.

The sound of his voice startled her. It seemed harsh, distrustful.

"Why did I do that?" she repeated, hesitantly.

"Yes, 'that'. Cover my back. Or back up my cover" she cringed, reflecting his wisecracks were awful at its best "Was it for protecting me? Or are you trying blackmailing me?"

His voice could slice steel, and it blew up her temper. Then she screamed before being able of stopping to herself "What do you mean with it? How can you think like that? So low is your opinion about me?"

His grim countenance darkened very much, and she realized too late he had got plenty reasons to be distrustful. He lived in a place where everyone looked forward to one chance to backstab him, and she was his prisoner. So much as she hurt he thought she could use an advantage to destroy him, he was right in that. She could, and in fact she'd have done so if the opportunity had presented formerly.

So why did she not want doing that now, and why was she disgusted with he thinking she was capable?

"I'm not blackmailing, Summers. Besides, If I tried, you could get me executed easily, couldn't you?" she amended. "But I DO think is fair you answer me other question. Is true they told?"

He kept quiet for a while, examining her. Probably studying each detail, each expression and each twitch of her muscles and eyes.

"Yes." He stated finally, and shut up her mouth.

She felt her chest suddenly lighter. Something fluttered inside it.

"Why?" She pleaded. She wanted hear it.

He stared at her bewildered. "Why? Are you asking me why? PRECISELY YOU?"

It was her turn to stare back bewildered. "Yes. I'm asking that."

He gripped the seat of the chair. "This is YOUR FAULT, woman. You are the cause I'm doing this. It's your fault. All was perfect, or so I could delusion to myself, until you showed in my life to teach me how screwed it is!"

She gasped, but no sound came out of her mouth.

"How useless, unworthy, pathetic, sad it's! I wasn't glad with this, never seemed right or good or fair, but I might ignore it and obey orders, I could bow to Apocalypse and kill who he said me that deserved to get killed. I could ignore the damned GAP in my chest, the BLOOD staining my hands, the HATRED of my own kin for getting things I never wanted, the WAY my fore father manipulates me, the miserable LIE my life is. But you showed then. You damned spirit, your pride, your arrogance, your bravery, your fire, yourself, opened my eyes. You did me question to Apocalypse. You did me question why I followed his orders ever. You showed me the truth, and since then this place has made less sense each time!"

He rose up, and began to pace. He halted facing her, and spreading his arms.

"Look me. Look this place. Here people that are defeated in battles or are unlucky enough to no get killed outside are dragged, jailed and tortured. We tell they're weak and that is their destine. However I've seen many of them. Proud and strong in his or her time, now turned in wrecks. And nobody clues ever any of us can be in that place. Samuel punches to the prisoners grinning and never thinks if Alex a day chooses to cripple him and throw in the pits he'll downright defenseless, and nobody, neither his sister, will help him. Anyone of us can be in there, a pale hide of a living being. We believe ourselves the strong ones, but any strongest than us can slaughter suddenly for whatever reason."

"The strong ones. Ha! That's funny. It's suppose we are the best, our power makes us best, but the only single thing the strong ones make is beat up to people who can't stand on their feet ever to defend themselves. Where is the pride, the honor in that? Where is the victory in blowing someone wounded, maimed, defenseless that barely can plead with cracked voice? Where is the strength in that? Where is the power? Is that all we can do? Isn't there anything better than this?"

"Look the smirking Infinites. They laugh and boast while char people, but never realize they are born of the repugnant McCoy's soup, cooked with the people they look down and slander about. Never realize in their foolish, absurd gall and selfishness they're just lab experiments, who will last few time before dying, and really matter to no one, Apocalypse the least of all"

"Look the Madri. They pray and sing and shout, worshipping to Apocalypse. Neither knows they were created cloning until the death a poor, anodyne mutant that ended crazy? Neither knows Apocalypse thinks of the clones? They're really other link in the food pyramid, more pawns easily discardable. All of us are to Apocalypse. But we don't wish see it."

"I walk along the tunnels, among the pens, and saw the people frightened from me, seeing a kind of devilish monster. All screech and whimper and back off and stay away and run away from me. Is that power? That is nothing but fear! I've studied history! Any HUMAN dictator could get that effect, and without mutant powers!"

"We gloat being the new race, the upper kind, but look this world. We behave like humans, kill and die like humans and destroy anything we see like humans. We are the self-proclaimed superior race, but the only thing we're doing with that superiority is razor this world, kill, kill, kill, always kill, and we're moving us toward a world war who NOBODY can win. Apocalypse says the fittest and strongest will survive. Apocalypse is a fool! Nobody is going to survive to the storm of death he plans unleash. A fool and a self-centered egoist! He can't care less 'his genefolk'. While he survives, nothing else matters to him. Nothing and nobody. But we're too much fool to understand it, even thought it's obvious. We're serving to one madman!"

For then he had crumbled on the floor, seated on the carpet and with his knees drew high, covering his face. His arms were wrapped around them, embracing his shoulders. And he hiccuped and sobbed strongly, releasing all of it, at last letting loose all he had buried down during years.

Years of hurt. Years of loneliness. Years of seeing violence and blood. Years of suffering in secret. Years of controlling himself. Years of lies and hidings. Years of hollowness.

Jean was stunned. He'd been listening to her during all their arguments. All of them. And they had got an effect in him stronger than a nuclear bomb. She'd got in him a power that nobody else matched.

She raised, and strode as far as him, kneeling to his height. However, while she leaned her knees on the ground, the picture blurred and vanished slowly.

*********************************************************************************

A cloak of blackness filled their sight, and when it dissolved, they were abruptly back in the physical world. All except Psylocke sucked his or her breath when saw the ground approaching to all speed.

Pietro brought forward a leg more hastily than usual to regain his balance while gasped surprised the whole, startling memory had been printed in his head in the short span between two steps. Shocked, he went on running, the rest following his trail.

They remained quiet, sprinting along with Jean. Ororo was the first speaking.

Was that real? I mean, did he say those exact words actually?

Jean grumbled. Ro, I'm a telepath. I NEVER forget things

Psylocke nodded in agreement. He suggested you got those thoughts into his head. Don't you-

NO Jean flared in every head with a roar. They winced. I did nothing. He decided rebel against Apocalypse and the people who had harmed him on his own freewill

She paused a bit, and then continued. He isn't like them. He's, in his core, a decent, honorable, merciful person. There was something in him not even Sinister could manipulate, resisting the conditioning, enduring the evil surrounding him. He hadn't served to Apocalypse if someone would have give an alternative or exit. But nobody did, nobody knew see it, nobody looked past the rough facade

Pietro and Ororo, her two oldest friends were amazed and curious hearing the deep, bitter sorrow creeping into her voice. They were going to ask about that, when she talked again into their minds.

I've always believed in the redemption, and now more than never. When I found out the way he'd broken with his former life, rejecting what he did and loathing what he was, and had risked saving lives, I just KNEW I'd to help. He had changed for the better and thanks to me, wouldn't be fair I gave up in him now, as all the rest did. I agreed being part of the Elite and pretended being one of them for that, and he and me have lived the last two years endangering our lives saving people

Psylocke sensed her partners were in awe, specially the poor Lorna, but she was feeling other emotions more coming from Jean. A certain burst of feelings, swiftly squished and repressed. She wanted to perform a discreet sweep, to find out what was it all about, but suddenly her psychic alarms sparked in life.

"Look out! Two enemies are incoming ahead of us!" she shouted in warned.

Less than a split-second later, a thunder and a flash tore the stillness of the tunnel, and with loud crackles two lightnings of blue-white electricity seared the air rushing towards them with deadly intention.

Their strength was terrific and their speed was blinding, but life-preserving instincts kicked, and the group dodged, zigzagged or sidestepped. Jean rose up her head with glowing challenging eyes, but kept her cowl carefully on.

Fuck! They're Northstar and Aurora! They must have switched shifts! she broadcast to her partners.

"Shit!" growled aloud Pietro "Scatter you!"

Storm clenched her fists, and spheres of lightnings burst and crackled on them. Psylocke leapt, invoking her psychic blade, and Lorna gulped saliva wondering if she was up to this fight. Her power and her stamina were very worn off. However, an unfathomable dread to be dragged back to the pits was showing, and it caused determination settling in her and giving her steel to her spirit. She'd fight and win her freedom, or die down there, but NEVER, ever, she'd be arrested again.

"Leave Northstar to me" Pietro fumed, and bolted onwards, fading in a blur of speed.

*********************************************************************************

Wind streamed howling with violence and dragging massive boulders in its wake. Gales of wind blew, clashed with each other and swirled making whirlwinds, before bursting. And in their wild and unleashed orgy, carried with them the rumbling sound of legs running with such speed plowed furrows on the tough floor, fists pummeling in flesh with rock-cracking strength, and blinding bright electricity bolts exploding.

Two blurs of color and speed rushed ramming in each other, and after parting.

Forcing the sonic speed, Pietro positioned behind Northstar a second after of being in front of him, and his fists linked to hammer brutally downwards, using his speed and momentum to multiply his strength. His rival got out the way in time, but the air his arms pushed was enough to explode a hole in the floor.

And then he rushed, sidestepping a thunder and facing to Bedlam.

"Why don't you surrender, genescum, and accept the unavoidable? Both of us know how will end up this."

"This is your mistake, Bedlam. Only ONE of us knows how this will end up, and you aren't." Pietro spat, and sneered. "But we know you'll not kill me. I'm too sexy to die, am not I?"

"Don't flatter to yourself." Growled the Canadian, streaming forward.

"I don't." Stated Quicksilver, bolting simultaneously. "But I think your High Lord must be very thankful for you being queer. Or else you might breed."

"How do you dare?" He yelled. Other electricity blast erupted out his fingers.

"Excuse me? Do you kill people for being different than you, but you don't like jokes about you being different?" Pietro snarled, ducking and sprinting along a wall. "I've got no troubles with the gay men, but you are quite the shame of your kind. And according to your own beliefs, you should let me kindly break your bones"

"THAT DID IT!" He screamed, while a blue-white lightning lunged over him and threw a punch. He dodged nimbly, and whirled; then cupped his hands and lightnings gathered and crackled in a giant ball he shot forward. The massive discharge struck the floor and imploded in thousand tiny lightnings, darting at everywhere. Arcs of power crackled in his hands and he released a barrage from them. The formerly dim and murky passage enlightened with light of a storm, and the walls moaned while withstood the blasts.

Northstar blasted and fired energy, his mind hoping Pietro was at least paralyzed by the tiny sparks, and his bigger discharges charred him.

However, his prey was in nowhere. He halted the assault and gagged, bewildered and amazed.

A hand taped on his shoulder. Two milliseconds after, his fist arched backwards. Unfortunately a fist had smashed his face in-between.

He fell down and rolled as far as the next wall, hitting it with his back. He raised quivering, his body and face filthy with the blackened dust.

Pietro grinned. He said nothing, just unleashed a wide and glowing beam abruptly at a target was already vanishing when his fingers flashed.

Northstar barely made out a fist coming from nowhere, just in time for blocking it. Pietro ran away before he retaliated. And then clutched his belly, which was hurting terribly.

He whimpered and stared upwards. He had never seen that hit. "It's impossible. You can't be so-"

"What? Fast? Quick? Speedy?" said Pietro calmly. Northstar could distinguish only the blue trails he was leaving in his run, going and coming around.

Suddenly, Bedlam was hurled against the opposite wall. He had barely felt the impact when his back struck another wall.

"Oh, I'm warming up just." His mocking voice echoed of everywhere and nowhere at the same time. "My real speed is more like THIS!"

Northstar scrambled on his feet and glared.

Quicksilver was in nowhere to be seen. Not even his trail remained.

A monstrous blow pummeled his face. After other hammered his back. Something sharp kicked his guts, a swishing sweep hit on his ankles, and he was tossed around and pounded on the floor.

All in the interval of two seconds.

Then it came.

Punch after punch after punch, striking, pummeling, striking, hitting, and smashing with a raising, unceasing rhythm. Dozens of fists crushed him in the first seconds, and he lost the ability to tell one of another after the next waves. Soon he'd lost the ability to tell what was happening, while his muscles turned in jelly and his bones were shattered. His ears sensed a loud, booming rumbling, a constant and steady sound, made with hundreds of hits threw in such close space of time their sound had mixed in n only deafening rumble.

He was still moaning, his body scattered in the floor, a numb and motionless heap, whimpering through broken teeth, and twitching, when the sound slowly ceased. It remained ringing in his ears nonetheless.

Pietro was over him, with his fists raised, realizing he didn't realize the beating had halted. His brain kept registering an endless rain of blows squashing him and stomping him and pulverizing him.

He walked away, with the silence of someone lost in his thoughts. However, when he had turned the fist corner, his knees gave away, and he stumbled against a wall. During the fight he'd pretend be in perfect fit, but in reality he'd forced his body beyond his limits. The plight on the pens had weakened him, but if he let to Northstar see his weakness, he was over.

"I hope they are fine." He muttered, thinking about his friends clashing against Aurora.

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"Die! Die all! Die, die, die!"

"Her vocabulary is expanded past one word! I'm impressed!" Psylocke sneered while somersaulted backwards, bending her body as a willow stick to dodge the attacks.

Aurora roared relentlessly her threats as shot bolts everywhere. She fired several times from a place, then flew at other in half-second and fired from there, getting them confused and unbalanced. It wasn't working. 

Neither of the rebels could overpower her speed, and Jean Grey couldn't use her powers in an obvious way -would be caught right away-, but Marvel Girl and Psylocke might use her telepathy to foresee her plans, and to the two of them, thinking and action were the same thing. And the speed thought is the light speed. Aurora couldn't top that.

And was frustrating her, although she didn't know the reason which her preys were evading her for.

She blasted a cannon shot of electricity, but the rebel Storm spun around, and linked her arms to unleash another blast. Both glowing lightnings met halfway in the air, and parried, each one struggling against the other. Aurora sweated and tried shifting her tactic, stopping of emit energy. The Storm's beam engulfed hers and rocketed towards her, but she sidestepped, and hurled a barrage of rays with both hands. Storm comfortably clashed, and answered with streams of wind and electricity. Aurora was so focused, she didn't notice the air becoming damper. Perhaps she'd think that was benefiting her not matter what.

Jean didn't speak or gloat. Be noticed was NO an option. Instead she placed her hands on the floor, behind of a column serving her like parapet, and made the floor to waver, pretending being a geokinetic. Land hummed and cracked, and a tide of ground rushed forward, roaring and steaming. Aurora saw that, and saw the Storm's lightning had bounced on the ceiling and was coming from up. She ascended avoiding one, and dodged another. However didn't dodge the cloud of thick dirt blanketing eyes, nose and mouth.

And then Lorna Dane, scorned, tortured and labeled by the Prelates like crazy and weak, used her magnetism and the humidity pervading the air surrounding to Aurora to channel all the remainder electricity she and Ororo had generated at Aurora. The Prelate was enveloped in a flashing energy ball, pulsating wildly with electricity, whose crackling roars choked the cries of Aurora.

Ororo fed the blast with more thundering beams as Lorna tested all the stuff made of iron nearby. She flung her arm, and walls and ground spat large and width metal layers, striking to Aurora and wounding in her four limbs. The ground was tore open and wires and pipes bolted outwards, coiling and shaking as snakes. They winded around Aurora, fastening around her and tightening.

Can you help with telekinesis or not?

Too dangerous. Better you give the final blow

Gladly

Psylocke leapt high, stepped on the wall, folded her legs and sprang ahead as a hawk, her psychic blade blazing savagely on her fist, and a challenging scream going out her lips.

"Is this enough strong for you, bitch?" she roared and struck her head with the knuckles, spearing her psy power in her brain. The knife sliced it like butter, and her mind shattered in thousand shards. She screeched and shrieked. Then ripples of telepathy washed over her brain, swallowing and drowning her.

The light on her eyes blinked off, and her limbs lost strength. When her body was limped, Lorna freed her hold, and she was dropped down. Her body hit the floor and rolled sideways. Her eyes were white, dead-like.

Psylocke somersaulted and landed skillfully. Instantly she folded her knees and clutched her stomach. Her skin was singed and bruised in several spots, ugly patches of black and violet branding her hide. The bitch had injured her more than she'd like.

The other three girls gathered beside to her and approached slowly at Aurora, powers at ready.

Two hands clapped.

They rose their guard up, but the person was a very bemused Pietro, leaning on a broad rusty pipe.

"A great battle, girls. Words can't do it justice. I wish father was here to see it." He congratulated.

"Words can't do justice to I'll make to you if you call me 'girl' again" Psylocke growled.

"Calm down, sister. I know Pietro didn't intend an offense."

"Magneto will must to come here to see a battle if we don't rush." Jean warned at all. "And the time I counted with is ebbing minute after minute. Let's go."

The group nodded, and they started to run again.

*********************************************************************************

They were standing next to the docks.

Psylocke gazed the black, cold water, polluted with the toxic wastes of the stronghold and the rotten corpses cast in the Atlantic. A soft, nearly imperceptible breeze blow at them from the sea, pushing little waves at the shoreline, and caressing them with a peaceful feeling. However she felt homesickness rather peace.

She was thinking about her England, wondering herself if she'd return back to see it some day ever. Would she survive so long? Would she be fit to travel? Would she like what she'd see? Would her homeland remain how she remembered, or it'd be leveled and burnt by Apocalypse for then? 

"We must part ways now, pals." Said Jean waving the stone pier. "I can't help you anymore, and I have to leave now and go back, but I hope you can make it from here until the secret hideout."

She beamed sorrowfully. Pietro nodded vehemently. Ororo bit her lips. Jean cringed looking her face. The African goddess was about of weeping in grief.

"Goddess, J-my dear friend, can't you come with us?" She sobbed. "We all miss you. He-"

"She can't help it, Ororo." Quicksilver cut off her, ceasing the torture to one very relieved Jean. Still she didn't feel relieved for that only. "We understand. I'll explain all to the rest."

She nodded smiling. "Thanks, Pietro. Please, tell to Magnus it wasn't his fault."

"I'll do." He assured her, and then said something did her heart skip several beats. "Some message for Logan?"

She gulped, feeling her throat suddenly dry. "Yes. You say him... say him I'm fine and he mustn't get worried. See he understand that, it pass through his thick skull. Tell him it wasn't his fault either, and ask him he doesn't break into to rescue me. I'm fine, and I've got a mission here."

"The job needs be done" nodded Pietro. "Take care of yourself."

"Good-bye, my partner. I wish we see again at each other, and in pleasant circumstances."

"Remember shield to yourself in every moments. And get ready always a getaway backup plan only in case."

"I-I can't thank you enough times you save me. If your gambit get dangerous, run away, please. I'd like me to see you again."

"Less talk, more run away. Good-bye, friends." She mumbled, embracing to everyone, kissing to Ororo on her cheeks, and stepping back slowly.

At last, she spun away, and leapt in the darkness, her green cloak flapping behind her as wings.

The X-Men wiped out their tears and moved. They had to honor her pleads and reach the X-refugee.

*********************************************************************************

Long hours had passed since then.

From her window she observed the world below covered in a coal-black mist of gloom and murkiness.

Even with the setbacks, the plan had been executed smoothly. There was quite distrust, but the alibi she and Scott had made up worked neatly. She noticed they were under suspect like always, but nothing had been proved. However, bearing in mind the glares Alex was hurling at Scott, or the quirk of the McCoy brows, they weren't clear out of the official reports.

However Sinister of all people had accepted thankfully her explanation and the backup of Scott. They were fortunate, since Alex wasn't above of hooking a Prelate to the McCoy gadgets and looking away if he thought he or she was lying him.

She recalled his snarling face when Essex said him he was looking forward his report. He was the Security Chief, but he hadn't been able of shedding light on the numerous evasions, neither hunting down to the responsible. Therefore, he'd to write three X-Men, one of them a field commander, had fled out the pits and taken down two Prelates, helped by a mysterious cloaked strange.

So he'd be going mad and ravenous for finding the culprit, or culprits, seeking the Sinister favor. And if he thought he might destroy his brother at the same stroke... She was far sure he was suspicious Scott's since that day, and also of her, but until now he had could prove nothing. They were being extremely careful, but had got very close calls. Still Sinister gave his full support to Scott, and seemed to trust in her. Jean guessed he wished make her another pawn in the weird chess game he was playing. The same as Scott.

Get free to her old partners was very risky and chancy, but it had to be done, and done soon. Couldn't be allowed Beast got his claws on them. They planned the best they could the rescue, and it was going to coincide with the Dane's one. She wasn't sure of the convenience of that, but it was a lucky circumstance.

Now their movements would be fully watched, and their first mistake would surely be the last one. The British was right. They needed be ready for running away. Just she wasn't sure of wanting to run away now. No if it meant leave behind to Scott. And he was committed to pay back his sins of one way or other.

She couldn't betray him like everyone.

Scott.

Her thoughts leaded unwillingly at other man who she admitted reluctantly hadn't thought of in months. Logan. She prayed he listened to Pietro and respected her choice. But he was very bull-headed and impulsive, she wasn't sure he wouldn't intend. And she pleaded he didn't come, since she couldn't face him right now.

If he had rescued her when she was trapped at the beginning, she ignored that she'd have done. She wouldn't admit it then to herself, but a part of her didn't want to be rescued, not wanted to be free. Not matter that Logan would have done, she'd be torn.

Logan. She had always thought of him as her soulmate, the only person she truly needed, the only in that world of pain. She was convinced she only needed to him, and loved to him only. But now...

Scott was so different than he was, and so similar at the same time. He was other sort of man, firm and controlled, a rock of stability where you could be attached to, someone who you could depend on, count with, and trust in. Someone firm and certain, who would be always there if you needed him.

Logan was loyal and honorable at a fault, but he was flicker, and let his emotions ruled over him constantly, even getting in the way of his reason or morality. Sometimes he let to be dragged by them, forgetting his humanity, and she was scared.

She knew he was sweet and caring under his gruff exterior, but she had never said to him how much she suffered when he fell on his berserk state, how much she suffered seeing the man she loved turning into a wild beast, how much she suffered when she had to patch his mind together again. Every time he always vowed never again, and she knew he meant, but what he wanted seemed matter little. She agonized each time it happened, and she'd never tell, never in one million of years, that she couldn't bear to see him like this. She would never confess what it tore her apart.

And the worst part was she tended to lose herself in the rush of the emotions churning in her like Logan, and the idea of losing the control like this was frightening. And she had let her temper, her fury, her stubbornness, her bullheadedness cloud her and swallow her. Could she become like him? Logan commented they were both of a kind, with a beast within and wanting let it free. It was bound to be flatterer, but it'd scared the hell out of her. And what she was scared with the idea of being like her lover wasn't anything nice or she was willing to admit, but she knew deep down.

Scott. The contrast with him had been huge in that side.

She'd realized when she saw him that his emotions boiled inside him likewise, seeking eat him alive. However, he possessed an uncanny self-control, an absolute ruling over himself that both she was intrigued for and envied secretly. She wondered how he kept his emotions so tightly bottled. He hated control loss. He loathed it, despised it, and avoided it. He was master of himself. He conserved his self, his identity, and it was something nobody could take away of him ever. And it was the motive he'd conserved and kept his decency, his honesty and his heart out of danger, untouched by the corruption surrounding him. She'd like to can tell that of herself. She didn't want admit that either, and never would say loud, but was a trait she liked him in a man.

With Logan there was much passion. Overwhelming, impetuous, feverish. She might burn in him. They were both of a kind, certainly. A good chemistry gave between them had charmed to Jean. However, she stared past that good chemistry, to see what other things she and Logan got in common, what there was out their passion, and she averted swiftly the sight. No liking her she had seen.

Nothing.

She wanted deny it.

Emptiness.

She wanted deny it.

Hollowness.

But the most time she passed away of Logan and away of his lifestyle -living only the present, never caring for the future, giving in her primal emotions, no looking for another thing than quench them- the most she saw it. And looked away, not wanting see it.

Nothing.

She loved him, didn't she?

Emptiness.

She was attracted for him, drawn to him.

Hollowness.

But was it enough? The true thing was she couldn't find anything else in their relationship. They were good together, but wasn't clear they worked together on the long-term. Passion without substance, that was. And she was just now beginning to see it. And it hurt her.

The sensation with Scott was so different. And she pleaded forgiveness for thinking like that, but she couldn't deny it.

In reality, he had always been different. Of the devils surrounding him, but also of any person she'd known.

Even without her telepathy, she noticed he wasn't like them all along. They were so fanatically SURE, convinced of the things they did were right, and never questioned them, using cruelty and violence with no measure. But Summers wasn't ruthless or violent. Of course, he could kill willingly, she had seen him returning to cast away his blood-drenched costume before showering, but him... did it as a machine, an automaton. A robot fulfilling orders without question. His emotions were squished and deeply buried, but she knew he was very, very unhappy.

That was his trouble, and salvation, she decided. On the contrary than the rest, he didn't BELIEVE in the crimes they made. He obeyed orders because didn't know act otherwise, because nobody gave him other alternative ever. She had learned he was raised with 'Obey or get killed' mentality. But he wasn't evil.

Unlike than the others, who would never follow up another option, even if was offered, since they were comfortable with their lifestyle.

But he was very different. She could see that. She recalled have seen him stopping to the fugitives with minimal force, stopping to the jailers when they were too enthusiastic, and never saw him enjoying beating 'weak ones' or being mean only for the sake of being.

No, he wasn't evil. No really. She realized, and the why he went on obeying to Sinister was beyond her. She had said him many times, trying revealing him the truth, but he had turned it down unceasingly. Nonetheless he was more shaken after every conversation. One time she was screaming him to drill it in his brain when he slapped her, yelling. Asking why she did this to him. In that moment his voice was a growl for the volume but a plead for the tone. After he beat a hasty retreat. And it was a retreat. She had the distinct impression of she had done him more damage with words than he did to her with violence.

Thus was it. And she understood it afterwards.

She got doubts many times about the Logan methods, his viewpoints, and his beliefs. She even was distinctly sure that he wouldn't renounce to his ideals for her. If she was contrary some day to something he was about of doing, and he considered it fair or necessary, he'd carry out it, regardless her. And if she was frontal opposite to him, until the point of losing the life, he'd not yield.

Her death would torn him apart, a man broken and with half soul ripped from him, letting him bleeding. He wouldn't forgive to himself ever. But he would do it nevertheless.

Utterly opposite to Scott, who likewise followed unwaveringly a path when made a choice, but had questioned all his beliefs, ideals and actions since his adolescence for her. He had seen his world rocked upside down by her, and had turned down a life of luxury and pleasure, a life of kings, for her. He had left behind his adoptive father and his brother for her, without looking back. He risked his life in a constant basis for her, a life fully changed only for the single blazing sparks in her green eyes.

She was the only person who had seen and pulled out the gold in his inside, the only being who had done him wish being better person. And damn if it wasn't flatterer.

And now they were collaborating together in saving lives. She noticed each prisoner rescued, each person saved, each life preserved released a bit more the burden he bore. But he would never be satisfied, never feel free and clean.

She lived still in his chambers, talking with him, eating with him, living with him, plotting with him. It was extremely inward and intensely intimate. He wouldn't touch her. But she saw the stealth glances he gave her, the way he was protecting her and keeping her safe, the sorrowful, wishful thinking aching in him when he thought about her.

Often she tossed relentlessly in her bed, shaken with a black nightmare of death and oblivion haunting her, and she became aware in the middle of her sleep of him seated on the side, looking her quietly and watching over her dream.

He, who was the only good person capable of loving and feeling in that cursed citadel. He, who was handsome and noble and brave. He, who was a true hero. He, who had changed for her. He, who cared for her. He, who thought of her the light of his soul, the only good thing had happened to him in his entire life. He, who despite of his endearing qualities, virtues and worth kept on seeing to himself the same blood-stained murderer servant to Sinister and lapdog to Apocalypse. He, who worshipped her. He, who had fallen in love hard, very hard with her, but never, ever, no in one million of years, would confess his absolute devotion to her.

Simply, he saw absolutely worthless of her, a dirty butcher who had no business loving to someone. He thought his touch would soil anything he stroked, and he didn't want to stain her with blood. She was, to his eyes, pure, the only thing pure, and she had to remain pure.

She did know, but he would never say. And part of her prayed, pleaded, begged, he wouldn't do. Put simply, because she was insecure of the answer.

And it was frightening her.

*********************************************************************************

End of Part One.

Notes: Did you like? Or not? My plan is convey the entire Age of Apocalypse and even go beyond of Onslaught. Excuse me? How can I cover the normal timeline? Read and you will know.

Next Part: The X-Men fight the High Lord army in Seattle. The man who they shall meet and his revelations will get the impact of a bombshell in that reality. Scott and Jean survive in the pens while Magneto scatter to his X-Men in worldwide missions.


	2. The Beginning of the End

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Age Of Apocalypse: Shifting Times

Author: Jenskott

Summary: What if had Weapon-X not rescued to Jean Grey out of the pens?

Notes: Here shows up the AOA Marrow's version. The issue of making up her character bothered me, since she's one of my favorites. She had to follow the AOA rules, and it means getting fundamental differences of personality, but with core parts of it intact, and her aspect couldn't be exactly equal. I preserved the personality rules, but I couldn't do something too radical to her features -like a maimed arm or large and ugly scars crisscrossing her hide- because according my judgment her mutant power implies some healing factor. At the end I opted for using the personality rules and the rule of adding an ironical twist to her background story.

Rating: PG-13.

Disclaimer: Sadly they belong to Marvel Comics.

Feedback: To jorgisimox@hotmail.com. Very cherished and appreciated and beloved. However English isn't my native language, therefore forgive my very obvious mistakes. Still I'll thank polite advices.

*********************************************************************************

Part Two. The Beginning of the End-

Winds of numbing frostiness blew with a sinister hissing around of the ghastly, wretched mansion, frowzy and looming with its bleak, crumpled facade shrouded in the shadows of the murky sky. The grim, haunted appearance of the large house -a lavish manor in happier times- was eerie and unsettling to anyone. Nobody could possibly want inhabiting that place, with the walls collapsed, the bricks and the plaster eroded with rain, wind and ivy, shattered windows with black pits on them and craters splitting the floor around the house. Cracked boulders, debris and dirt littered the erstwhile green lawn, and dry and scrawny skeleton of burnt and blackened trees -nobody recalled their species anymore- circled the state, quivering and shuddering with each passing gust of fresh wind.

No person might, effectively, reside in that barren wasteland at its own volition. And it was exactly what the X-Men wished seemed. Hide in plain sights a motto to live, literally in this instance.

The torn and ravaged appearance of the haven was deceiving, since it stood out to any random foreigner, who didn't notice the little, telltale signs there was all over the place. The windows locked deliberately to obscure the darker shadows danced behind the shades, the exaggerated destruction some walls had endured -brickwalls of mostly unused and too visible corners-, the heaps of cracked bricks piled in front of doors and corners as masking something or blocking up some way in, footprints faked with rubble and pebbles, and the tiny and faint noises the wind carried, muffled with the deep howls of the moaning air.

Deep in the mansion, a bellow of fury, of barely restrained rage and indignation was voiced, with a lurking, almost pleading despair vibrating subtly in its roughed, harsh tone. Was plainly clear even with the hostile, wild anger flaring in it, the person was shaken with a distraught grief and a tormenting guilt.

"Damn you, Lensherr, let me go!" Snarled Weapon-X, his furry fists crossing in front of his glowering face. With a slashing noise his claws unsheathed, a slayer glint shining on their razor surface. He seemed ready to chop and quarter gleefully to the speedster if he followed on restraining him.

Pietro remained downright undaunted, hurling an unyielding stare with a curt frown. To reinforce the impression he folded his arms with a care painstaking to such rash person like himself. "No, Logan"

Both were facing to each other in a room over the South side. A couch torn and tattered, and several chairs and one table were the only furniture in the room, barely lightened with a meager bulb light.

The place lacked of the splendid luxury once possessed, but it didn't mean Magneto wasn't mindful of the comfort necessary they needed to carry on their war. He was determined to do the daily life in the mansion maybe no entirely enjoyable, but at least comfortable and bearable to his X-Men, so they didn't fall apart altogether. The furniture was sparse and there wasn't artificial light in any room other than the living quarters and chambers where machinery was stored or in use. The hidden life of guerrillas and undercover war demanded austerity, thrift and prudence, but the X-Men knew better than complain, and had learnt to be happy with the little they had. Agree the life the remainder world bore was another matter, utterly different.

So in that former living room, two men were regarding to each other warily, albeit Pietro maintained a mask of nonchalant aloofness and Logan concealed it with his usual rage. Quicksilver perused carefully to his partner, taking no only in his physical looks -the bluish black outfit clung tightly to his stout and muscular body, the disheveled and long black hair wildly unruffled, the snarling expression of his stony face- but also in his emotions, the ones he could read at least, and that were most important anyway. He was downright choleric and outraged, on the brink of one of his known and furious berserker attacks, but it barely squished down and masked the emotions he was trying cover. Under that film of unleashed fury, he was edgy, next to frantic. He was fretful and afraid. Afraid of what?

Pietro rubbed his temples with the fingertips, wondering why he had to be doing this, and glanced to Logan with sadness and severity at once. "No, Logan. It was no half-hour ago, it's no now, and it'll keep on being no! Don't matter how much effort you put in looking dangerous and ominous. You aren't going."

Logan lashed furiously his arm on a wall. Three deep gashes dented the plaster. "Don't say me what I have to do, Quicksilver! I don't follow your stupid rules and I'll do as fucking pleases me!"

A silver brow arched infinitesimally. "Then why are you here yet? If you aren't willing obey-"

He cut off him "Don't tempt me. Sometimes I do that question to myself."

"And the answer is?" The field commander temporized, hoping quelling him. If he only worked with him...

Weapon-X turned thoughtful suddenly. "Because I don't like the shit Apocalypse is feeding to the world with, and this seems the best place to stop it. And I don't get a hell of many other options. Many times I've thought leave you in the lurch, walk out and no looking back. But I can't look aside and ignore to Blue Lips because sooner or later the shit will reach with me; and I can't fight him alone and expect seriously win. Only Magneto has enough sources and wits to use them. Besides, without Jeannie would be no worth."

Wide opening here. "Then you must understand. She's doing an important job in that hellhole. She's helping to save lives, helping to the cause and protecting to the people. She can't leave it now. You bursting into, slicing your way through waves of Infinites and snatching her away would turn to be disastrous to her and likely to our single ally over there. It could even get them killed. She pleaded me tell you don't rescue her. Will you not listen her pleads? Can't you grant her the only favor she asked?"

"You don't understand!" He protested, waving angrily his arms. "There's no way I'm leaving her in that lair of fucking bastards, with Summers on her trail-"

He gasped and trailed off abruptly.

His shifting mood didn't go unnoticed to his opponent. Pietro stared at him, blinking. "Do you mean this is for you being jealous?" He queried incredulously.

"No, it isn't" Logan shouted, kicking the floor in frustration, disliking the annoyance, surprise and mild disappointment he could smell and hear from Quicksilver. "You only don't understand!"

"Make me"

Logan paced the floor around, moving in relentless circles. The fury he had used to disguise his fear and agitation, his guilt, had worn off, striping him off defensive illusions and leaving the peevish misery was cloaked beneath it, written all over his face to all stare at. "Do you remember when we saw her after of leaving her behind? When she was sticking up for Summers and claming have defected?" He muttered ruefully, not looking at Pietro. "I doubted of her. I DARED to doubt of her. And now, knowing I've doubted for years of her, years that she spent helping us from the inside, watching for us while rescued people, stepping on eggshells amidst that pack of creeps… it's most I can bear, Lensherr."

Pietro kept his silence, respecting the grief of his teammate. He shook his head, utterly mortified. "I've let down her. It will never happen again. I've to redeem to myself, Pete. I must save her before she gets killed in reward to her altruism, and ask her for forgiveness. I owe it to her."

Pietro sighed inwardly. He stepped forward enough to give to the remorseful Logan some of closure, but without violating a personal space he could wish maintain. "You –we- doubted of her because she INTENDED we did, Logan. You did just you were supposed to do. I'm sure she felt hurt, but she knew beforehand it had to be of this way."

"But Logan, if you act now, you will throw her whole effort by the wayside. You will do what YOU want, no she wants and trusts you do. She needs being left alone now. And don't get worried for her; one of the Prelates is siding with her, and she can handle him to the other. And the rest are quite lame."

"Yes, I'm sure he'll be falling in with her a lot." Logan growled with a noncommittal tone.

Pietro gazed at him, exasperated, having grasped at the double sense and the sarcasm Logan shaded his words with. His suspects had just been confirmed. "Don't get ridiculous, Logan" He huffed. "If you and she are for real, she won't feel tempted for working along with other man, or will give up you not matter what. And if she decides she like him better, then she never was yours to begin with."

Logan cringed with it. "But-"

Pietro stepped forward, crossing the thin line they had established to peaceful conversation, and placed a tentative, reassuring hand on his shoulder. "You whined earlier of having doubted of her, and promised to yourself never do it again. Then why are you doubting now?" He stated calmly. Then chuckled ironically. "I am not a fine example to explain whatever the love is, but I AM what love is like. And of the little experience I have got, love is all about trust. Confidence. Belief. If you can't trust in her to choose you over someone else, then you can't love her with your whole heart. There will be always some corner filled with suspects and insecurities."

Weapon-X closed his mouth. When he spoke again, his voice was soft, meek. "You're right."

Pietro nodded eagerly, pleased of having talked him into that matter. "Of course I am-"

The grating noise of wood skimming over stone, and the feeling of someone entering in the room halted whatever reply of agreement was about of departing of Quicksilver's lips. Both men spun around to face the newcomer, a figure very hard of missing. The overpowering presence of Magneto always flooded the room, even if he didn't wear his gaudy costume, dark red as thick spilled blood, and the ample cloak billowing with each motion.

Magneto did a polite bow to his father, greeting with the apprehension of someone get used to receive bad news, while Logan chose give a lopsided, perusing gaze at the side of Magneto, mainly to the figure trailing beside to Erik, with a murky countenance steeling her features. She looked ignore defiantly the comforting gesture of the X-Men founder, the way his gloved hand grabbed her shoulder and ushered her calmly in the room.

Pietro noted the presence of the unknown girl with noncommittal surprise, and looked at the eyes of the red garbed man, grey-blue eyes that could have passed like his own. "One new recruit, Father?" He guessed.

The girl was a teenager, younger even than Clarice, with glaring eyes simmering with fury as blazing blue coals, and offering a stark contrast to her pale and emaciated, but stern and unyielding face. Her skin was of white-peachy color, pierced in several spots for dagger-like splinters of jagged bone, jutting out of each joint. On the forehead, thorax, forearms and shins the bones had outgrown enfolding the body as an armor, and out of her back protruded several long spikes of bone. Rests of tattered, frayed red rags covered scantily the bare parts of her skin, as a soiled and holed drape.

Pietro shivered inwardly. There was something absolutely off about the girl. Maybe the way she'd assessed to both when she showed, like trying to guess weak points and vulnerabilities. It recalled to one hawk sizing up a rabbit as a possible prize to hunt on the future. It was a scary, eerie in such young kid, albeit part of him labeled it as a welcome change to the soulless, hollow depths used to be the eyes of the writhing, weeping girls he had rescued.

Meanwhile Magneto nodded solemnly to his query with a quiet expression, and took off calmly his helmet. "Indeed. Victor and Kyle have just met her recently in her last exploration. She had killed a Madri on her own with one of her weapons."

Pietro arched his brows and Logan whistled. Both of they had slaughtered Madri in a regular, daily basis, but they were alpha-levels. If the girl had ended with one of those priests of the Devil, she was to be reckoned with. It wasn't her ferocious, untamed aspect and her forbidding scowl, ever present on her sharp face, said otherwise.

"It was sheer luck. I was tracking down a lot of Madri casually were stalking to that bulk of meat and his pet. I attacked right when they were ambushing them, killing to one of them and alerting to Creed and that lapdog. We saved mutually our lives and they talked into join me to the X-Men" She breathed deeply. "I'll be more than glad of helping to slit some throats of Blue Lips and his lackeys, but bear in mind I'm not being a good-goodie altruist. I want revenge, and working with you is a fine way of obtaining it. Besides, it's damned better to keep on scavenging ruins for an ounce of food."

Quicksilver had to give it, the girl was blunt and straight. And whereas her motivations might be too troublemaker, she seemed enough sincere and relatively trustworthy. Relatively. It was obvious a probation period was in order to admit her in the team.

Logan meanwhile had advanced to his orders and was stalking around of the girl, boring his hard eyes on her, and scrutinizing her with an unreadable, shady gaze. His nose breathed in deeply, very deeply, inhaling scents had little to see with the flavors the humans usually smell. The girl didn't flinch ever, neither squirmed, and if she was annoyed -and ought to be-, masked it very well.

Weapon-X at last stopped his pacing, standing three inches away from the lass. "What?" She snapped, folding her arms impatiently.

"You have the reek of Dark Beast all over you, lass."

She shook her head dismissively. "I was one of the mutants inhabited the Manhattan sewers." She stated.

Magneto remained quiet and reserved as the two men gasped in surprised astonishment. They had heard vague rumors, news lost among the tide of horrors assaulted constantly his ears and did their consciences to burn and smolder in indignant rage. The bloody tales reached them used to be so twisted and warped, but so believable in that maddened world, they were helpless to choose believe or not every gossip was spread.

And now they were facing one direct witness of the massacre years ago.

"My name doesn't matter, but my foes call me Marrow" She muttered softly. "When Apocalypse conquered New York many of the low-level mutants hid in the forgotten sewers and subways in the underground before being captured by Sinister or even worst, McCoy. We lived content and relatively happy down there, knowing we were at least, free and secure, and now I suppose we should have foreseen what happened next; Apocalypse wouldn't tolerate anybody content with his or her live. That bitch of Callisto, our supposed leader, betrayed us to save her worthless hide, and Sinister sent to his Elite Guards in the sewers, led by his damned Prelate Havok. They committed a savage carnage, killing innocent people, helpless people, good people who wanted nothing more than being left alone. I was about of getting away, but that dumb Guthrie blonde-boy caught me. We fought, and I nearly gutted him, when Moonstar nailed me with her arrows and I fainted."

"When I woke up, was one of the experiments of Dark Beast -who I'll met plenty pleasure in disemboweling, be sure-. He did me weird stuff, sliced me open and sewed, ripped off bones of mine to investigate their growing, and experimented with me, doing me things as speed up and increase my healing factor. It went on, until one night a shadow rescued me from the pens, evading the guards." Magneto and his two warriors exchanged swift glances. It wasn't unnoticed by Marrow, but she passed by. "Since then I've been surviving in my best, running away and hiding me, feeding me with anything remotely edible, when your the X-Men met me."

The group shut up, mulling on her words. The girl was definitely angry and resentful, and it could be highly dangerous. However, if that fury was channeled correctly, it might be a very useful weapon against Apocalypse. And above of all, the girl deserved other opportunity for knowing a better kind of life she had led.

Pietro weighed up slowly the words of Marrow, and the unspoken details and things he'd guessed perusing her as she narrated her past. He glanced askance to his father. He was so austere and circumspect as ever. He wasn't sure that some day he understood him ever.

"She can be a fine fighter, father, but she isn't ready yet for team work. Don't you believe she should work out for a while with Kitty and Piotr?" He suggested encouragingly.

Before Marrow protested with a scathing comeback, Magneto denied with his head. "No, Pietro. I don't believe. She wouldn't fit in with the members of the Next Generation. But she needs still learn to blend in the team." He mumbled.

We're traveling now to Seattle. Logan I require that you remain in the mansion with several X-Men, patrolling the grounds and watching over until our return. Also show to Marrow around and teach her the first things she must know."

Logan nodded reluctantly. Being left behind while his partners fought to protect innocent people and smash Infinites wasn't a task he enjoyed performing, but he was aware of the importance of defending one of their last refugees. And privately he was pleased of Magneto decided entrust him with that duty, considering him the best asset to protect them all.

"This is foolish" Marrow shouted suddenly "I can go along with the group, and sure as the hell you could need people"

"Ma-" Magneto began, but Pietro was resting a kind hand on her spiky and tough shoulder before he opened the mouth.

"Everyone of us are sure you are up to the fight, Marrow." He stated, careful of being polite and reassuring without coming out patronizing. It was hard, but his father relied on him to settle leadership troubles, and he yearned for opportunities to prove him right. "But this isn't about pride, revenge or chance. You must learn like we operate, act and fight, what are our norms and methods, and how your fighting style can merge better with ours. We aren't letting you aside, girl. We are merely getting ready you to field missions. Before you only get to take care from yourself, but now you're with others, and there're rules to be respected as long as you want remaining with us. You custom to work alone can be such handicap like anything else. Do you understand?"

She stiffened, and he thought for a second she'd snarl with a rebuke. But her darkened expression eased, and she averted her piercing stare. For a moment a wide window was open, and he caught a glimpse of the vulnerable, lonely kid she could have been. Sorrow and grief lurked on her eyes.

"I do." She mumbled. "It doesn't get to like me, but I do. Yet I can't promise I'll give away always so easy"

Pietro nodded, beaming. "Then that's all my father, Rogue and me can ask of you."

*********************************************************************************

Grotesque.

It was the reflection of Scott Summers, regarding the chaotic scene.

A column of burning red energy blasted through the chamber, slicing the air and striking head-on to his unsuspecting, airborne target. The crimson bolt rammed it with irresistible strength towards the opposite wall, thrusting with no effort the massive heap and plunging it in the wall.

A rain of debris and shrapnel of steel and wires exploded outwards, bouncing in walls and floor, and spreading a blanket of metallic garbage around of the place. The numb heap remained still and motionless, imbedded in weird and odd-looking machinery with the two legs sticking out, stiff as broad as two pillars.

Scott observed with a prominent frown the crumbled waste was now that evil-stinking cell, with the scattered debris scattered all about the floor like rubbish littering the dark and cold place. It remembered him to old films about Frankenstein. However those movies were old tributes to the literature of terror and fantasy, whereas that was the hard, palpable reality, seen with the full spectrum of colors. All right, to he was the entire spectrum of red, shades of red, and colors filtered through a red tint, but the phrase stood.

Grotesque, he thought again. McCoy and his brother had been about of getting turned into smeared puddles of flesh and blood, oozing over the filthy floor of the lab room, mixed with dry mottles of blood, grease and oil. And it would be brought about by the mutant they had been torturing and laughing about, bringing the punishment for their sins on their own heads, like in some strange kind of karmic balance or justice poetic. Right now the twisted, monster-like form of McCoy strolled towards him with an infectious smirk, trying dissipate his forbidding grimace and his taut motions with folly flattery, and idle questions about the Jean's whereabouts Scott knew he wasn't interested about at all. Dark Beast could be many and very unpleasant things, but on of them wasn't he was unfocused or slacking on his job.

"Enough!" He roared with very little mood and less patience to fake smiles. "Jean is where she pleases or is needed, Henry, don't try averting the conversation. In what sins' name are you doing this? You were ordered closing the lab" An ugly and dark grin enlightened his glum countenance. "Perhaps Sinister should be reported of your transgression."

McCoy cringed, stepping back, but before Scott could press further and corner him, Alex got in the way, snarling at him and grabbing one of his arms."

"Wait a damned minute, traitor to your country!" He growled, his temper flaring.

"Let me go, Alex" He commanded, feeling likewise a surge of fury, but refusing to yield to it.

He ignored him foolishly. "Even here, out of the pens, I'm still the security chief. And I take my duties very seriously! I'm not like some brats who emerge out of the pens only for showing off!"

Scott witnessed the storm with the same dispassionate, imperturbable posture of always. His controlled calm and coldness used more often than not pissing the hell out of Alex. Nothing fazed him. "Brats? Showing off?" He repeated with a dejected, sardonic grimace. "I believe you're mistaking me with YOURSELF, _little_ brother. You are the youngest, you're the driven in showing off to the whole wide fucking spinning world, and you were here not for performing your duties but for watching this" He paused with a disgusted snarl "torture. By the way, little brother, if I don't happen come by, what would have happened?"

"I'd have got by alone, arrogant-"

"It's enough!" exclaimed a voice, annoyed and disappointed, but refined. Its level had been low and mild, but sounded as a thunder to both siblings.

They turned instantly to greet to his adoptive father, Mister Sinister, who showed up with his costumed flamboyant manners and lord-like walking, amidst the floating rust and dust. The black-red ribbons of his shredded cape swayed slightly with its movements, and his pale metallic body glinted under the bulb lights giving him an appearance clearly gave away his name.

Sinister walked with paused stride as far as Scott, and shook his head with sad diffidence, and glanced to both. "Kids, kids. Haven't I educated you to both rightly by any chance? Never the Summers brothers shall you get along well?"

"I... I'm sorry, Sinister" mumbled Scott with disciplined and apologetic sincerity.

"Me too, Sinister, but you must understand. My brother was beginning to-"

"It isn't my business who started the fight, Alex; I am ending up it. Oh, and Henry" He stated off-handily at the perverse genius, with a lopsided gaze. "I observe you pursue with your experiments."

"I... this... isn't... what it looks like" McCoy stammered dully, stepping backwards with convulsive fear.

"Be sure it continues being that. Agreed?" The Apocalypse right-hand stated with a stern glint of his bloody eyes. The implied menace was painfully patent and implicit. Without waiting for an answer, he turned to Scott, beckoning him with a gesture to go with him outside. "Alex, clean this wrecked mess. Scott, accompany me a moment."

Both men left the lab, ignoring the murderer glow shimmered on the Alex eyes, scorned in his mind once more.

Father and son walked together and in silence along the winding hallways of the Tower, climbing upwards slowly. Soon they had emerged out of a balcony. Greeted by the wind, very cold at that height, and the lights pierced the thick layers of raven clouds and pollution, they rested on the railing. Scott Summers kept silent and hoped, knowing Sinister would choose speak when he considered both were ready to the conversation. Meanwhile he struggled against the wind, bent obstinately in snatching his long brown locks and covering his face with them. While his hands parted away the strands, bothered with the itching sensation on his skin and mouth, he felt the strange sensation of a weight choking him and taking his breath away him.

From that height, the majestic but fearsome Tower of the citadel, stood out against the remainder buildings of Manhattan, the capital of the Empire, and it hovered about the rest of the city like a devilish and threatening claw. The dim lights glittered meekly on the overcast sky, giving to the clouds shades of red and black as in a distorted reflection of the world below, and enlightened up the city with shimmering, dusky rays. The Tower stood alone and sovereign like a mountain, and around it advanced rows and rows of skyscrapers, tiny as ants. An endless landscape of buildings, whole and upright, or crumbled and fallen, stretched as far as the sight reached. Over other side could be seen New Nile -Scott had never understood why Apocalypse renamed it. Hudson River never resembled the African River, being a streamlet in comparison-, laden with the cadavers and skeletons and toxic wastes the river flowed into the ocean, where odd fishes and mutated carrion eaters scavenged among the corpses.

A more violent gust of air flowed towards both men, and it dragged with itself the endless howl was the bloodcurdling cries and screeches and shouts of the people suffering and dying thousand of feet underneath of them. The grief, the despair, the torment, the pain, the misery gathered and blended, stirring and warping. The hopeless, frightened shrieks of the doomed and dying, the starving and sick swirled making a vortex of screams, a nauseous and horrifying cacophony of sounds did the hairs stand on their end. It was a sort of yell come from the Hell did always to Scott step back nervous. Each time he heard that, a strong, nagging feeling of guilt assaulted his senses, and he felt something strangling him, the thick and intense feeling overwhelming and washing over him until he was rendered a soulless carcass.

He shivered. Then he realized his father was coughing to earn his attention, and Scott turned to him, anxious for something, anything to escape from that. Anything to escape to the dawning of his city was a mirror of the Hell, the incarnation of the Pandemonium on the Earth, with Satan ruling in the heights.

"I was to hopeful you followed on my footsteps some day" A reflective pause. "Scott, I have to go away"

A minute of stunned, shocked silence. "What?" Then came distress and denial. "No, sir! If it's cause of something I did-"

Sinister put up his wave up. "No all the things rotate around of yours, Scott." He sighed heavily. "Dementia has taken over to one of us. A madness I fear head us straight towards the Armageddon."

A gulp to unstuck a knot on the throat. "May it come to pass? So explosive is the situation between the humans and us?"

He queried that even though knew perfectly well the obvious answer.

"Listen me, Scott." Sinister spun sideways and moved his wave to circle the entire monstrous and misshapen city, the ominous and twisted buildings, the fires burning in many places, the airships sailing constantly and shooting randomly, the heaps of decayed and fetid bodies carpeting the murky roads. "We are gazing the end of world, and the worst is it looks back, granting us time only for regrets. Ahead of you stands mine ones. I have hardly spent one dozen of lives giving birth to one Hell on Earth, and now... Now I shall never be able enjoy of it."

He blinked aghast behind of his red visor. "I don't understand how you could give birth to one Hell. What do you mean with 'the End'? And who is the madness of?"

In better circumstances Essex could have found his eager and naive curiosity endearing.

Such like they were now, he merely turned around, and walked away from him.

"Alas, Scott, I've overprotected you. I have protected you too much. And for motives you can't imagine ever." He lowered his head, the proud figure seeming hunched and downcast for a passing moment. "And now you must seek knowledge on your own, for first time. Farewell, son of mine. Make me proud."

And with that he was gone.

Scott leaned against the rail, griping the metallic rafts with both hands while observed the last of the retreating shape of his father and mentor. His mind was a shaken, swirling turmoil. He tipped his head backwards, letting to the sunrays peeked out of the haze glimmering on his visor and stroking his forehead. He had believed having all the answers till he ran into Jean. And now the rug had been swept off his feet still again. He knew now he hadn't even the questions he had to figure out.

They were his grimy thoughts when several beams of golden light showed up Eastwards, searing the sky leaving a path of smoke and yellow fire, bent ninety degrees approaching to the shoreline, and skimmed near of Heaven. He bit his lips, alarmed and disquieted.

Scott? A concerned, helpful voice echoed within his mind, and he sensed a presence flaring into his head. He closed his eyes, basking in the glow and the warmth her soothing telepathic voice was giving him. I've felt you shaken of sudden. Is there any trouble?

He could have snickered. Any trouble? Well, it depended exclusively on your definition of the term. Nevertheless, he shut up that, albeit was likely she felt it. No. Only Sentinels. By the way, Jean I've just had with Sinister the conversation weirdest...

*********************************************************************************

The deafening silence of the trees was thick and weighed, creating an asphyxiating atmosphere of lacking of live and of decay. The forest was so dead and unfathomable as the silence shrouding it with a blanket of fake quietude.

The rumbling murmur of swift footsteps disrupted the heavy and numb air. The steady and pounding sound of a short figure sprinting through the woodland, dodging trees, ducking of branches and leaping about fallen trunks, all without missing the rhythm of the run. Suddenly the swift, nimble figure halted abruptly, hunkering down on the floor, and looking over. And sniffing.

Weapon-X inspected the floor, scrutinizing attentively the crunched twigs and the trails of fresh footsteps. Someone was baiting him, goading him to one confrontation, he was sure. The smell was familiar, but the whitened bones of a nearby hare, and the flies flying in circles over them were distracting his nostrils. That unlucky mammal had remained dead by starving for years, but he could sense still the fear, the despair and the begging yowls of the poor animal. He nearly could listen to its shivers and whimpers.

Focus He roared inwardly, straightening his body and steadying his nerves. This wasn't moment to reveries.

Magneto was out with Quicksilver, Rogue, and a mixture of both of their respective teams. Blink and Sunfire were scouting over the Middle West, and he was half fearing half expecting they would find -Neither of them trusted in the promises of the so-called treaty-. Exodus, Banshee, and Dazzler remained with him in the mansion, watching their lair, protecting to the toddler Charles and teaching around to the new one, Polaris, Psylocke and Marrow. They were vulnerable nowadays, and he had to be careful.

With that determination, he started to walk soundlessly. If someone was trying provoking a confrontation, he or she ought to face him sooner or later.

"I estimate we are enough farm from the mansion and deep in the erstwhile forest to remain unperturbed. Don't you opine likewise, X-Man?"

Whirl around on his feet and spring widely with the claws extended and shining with bloodlust was done with a single motion. He DID know the voice. He had heard it and cursed too often in his nightmares to don't. He clenched his knuckles and blades of adamantium sought for the vital organs. Maiming, evisceration and vivisection would make it nicely, but he'd finish quickly if he had.

Mister Sinister extended an arm and gripped the Logan's neck, halting dead his impressive and long jump. A scornful huff twisted his stony, unyielding features, and his steeled fist squeezed the windpipe to reinforce his point across. "Blood-thirsty as a tiger and wild as a wolverine. Mutants such like you and you partner Creed are really prime material of study about the human evolution, and a fine example of what the man mustn't be. An animal moved by instincts and passions, by its hunger and its mating urges, tossed around by emotions befuddle the rationality, obfuscate the fair judgment, and insult the brain millions of years of evolution gave us."

"F-fuck yourself" Logan grated. He wouldn't permit that man to see it, but it had strung painful chords inside him. He was sick and fed up of the people who insulted him and whispered behind of his back calling him a dimwit animal. He was a man. A man. He had proved it true plenty times, and certainly he considered to himself more human Sinister would never be able claim.

Though Sinister was obviously aware of it, of the insecurities, doubts, and fears undermining the bolstering confidence and unwavering pride of Logan. And he brought up it, used it and exploited with expertise and without any remorse to pull the strings suited him, obtaining the reaction he wanted. He smirked derisively, looking down to Weapon-X.

"Before continuing our instructive conversation, let me bring up your attention several facts: I'm here, alone and unarmed. Whereas if I truly wished to see your quarry annihilated, a whole company of Infinites, supported by Madri and Balrogs would be laying siege on the X-Men, with Apocalypse undoubtedly on the forefront of the storming invasion. Therefore my presence here can be due to other set of circumstances you can be drew in attending to"

Without hoping for an answer, Sinister arched backwards his arm and hurled viciously to Logan at the floor with a disdainful, mocking toss. During the fall, Logan reacted, pivoting his body to land on his four limbs, and barely had touched the dusty soil when he whirled impossibly swift, standing on his feet and leaning on a crouch while brought forward his claws.

Sinister disregarded the menacing stand and the lightning speed Weapon-X had moved with, and tossed to his feet with apathy one folder of plain light brown color.

"In that file you will find facts very interesting: details and reports about the last culls and plans to future ones –infringing blatantly the treaty-, accurate descriptions about the stronghold of the citadel, defensive systems of the Atlantic Wall and its weakest points, the plans of High Lord to the ultimate war he intends unleashing in Europe... Well, it is an educated guessed, since the strategy and attack lines haven't been specified and delineated yet, being it a mere draft, but I've sketched it bearing in mind the way of thinking of Holocaust and Apocalypse, thus I reckon it is accurate enough..."

Logan stood still, staring at him in stupefaction. Hesitantly he kneeled to pick up the folder, all the time without averting his sight away of Sinister, and opened slowly the folder, almost like if he expected a bomb blew up on his face. He leafed through slowly, scrutinizing to Sinister with a wary eye. The Horseman was giving him a mild, nonchalant look.

The Canadian man closed the document with studied calm, and faced to Sinister with a glare filled with suspects. "Now why have I so tough time believing you'd double-cross to Apocalypse all of a sudden?"

Essex remained impassive to it. After all, he waited some questioning, they would fools to accept that without any reason. "I'd like explain the why of this rash action, Weapon-X, but it'd mean explain my motivations, and I'm not supporter of broadcasting important information. However, I shall endeavor provide you with a stark resume, indeed: It benefits me."

Sinister shut up, no telling more, but the wary and distrustful Logan leer signaled him clearly was preposterous think he could get over with this so easily. With a low grumble, he dropped his arrogance mask and continued. "Not matter how ends the Armageddon Apocalypse plans, it'd spoil my own schemes right when they are ready for fructifying. Hence I'm giving away important information to his adversaries."

A hard, red-gleaming glare was hurled at Logan. "Don't confuse this, X-Man. I'm not a warrior thirsty of blood and cadavers as Apocalypse, but more of a chess player. I yearn to be the potter who moulds the next generation of living beings in this planet, the new God maker and forger of life, but Apocalypse only embraces the death, and seeks for a war where nobody shall survive, a development I haven't any interest for. Thus, knowing this time would come, I've passed years setting in motion my own designs. For that reason I found the last sanctuary of the X-Men, but I didn't notify of it. For it I'm giving you now this invaluable and useful piece of information. For it I let to my son acting freely to his heart's content, albeit I didn't ignore he'd been deluded to your side cause of that telepath."

Logan couldn't help gape foolishly, caught utterly off guard. Sinister waved a hand haughtily. "The way you use the information is up to you and is irrelevant to me: Keep in it, pass on to the Human Council... Yet don't make profit of it would be truthfully foolish. Besides" He turned around slowly, giving a sidelong glance at Weapon-X, who wrestled to keep his emotions in check and his composure neutral "if you're drawn into the welfare of your ex-member, I highly recommend you use that soon. I can't protect to Scott longer. And if he falls, nobody shall be able protect to Jean Grey."

And with the last statement, he spun fully, flapping his cloak pompously. A glowing tear flashed in the air and it split open, revealing a teleporting doorway. Sinister stepped into, and his figure faded away.

Logan remained motionless for minutes, leaving to the wind to dash and scurry among the trees and whip to his roughened face. He bit his lip and slid his blades into his forearms. A futile gesture of sheer and helpless impotence, meant to no more than relax him. His mind was shaken and feverish, looking over possibilities and trying to decide what had just happened. If he didn't know better, he'd be tempted of forgetting the entire matter, or labeling it as an odd hallucination.

"Shit!" He exclaimed, and hurried back to the mansion.

*********************************************************************************

I'm downright, redemptionless crazy Jean chastised to herself fervently, acidly, while she squatted carefully in the concealment of her proverbial watchtower, the lookout she was using.

The redhead telepath pressed her body onto the floor, propped on shoulders and knees would be sore later, and peeped attentively the scene unfolding underneath. She was perfectly aware of the least mistake in this situation, and she would be annihilated with the same easiness and simplicity someone snuffs out a candle with a gust of breath.

One thing was to disguise and get free prisoners out of the pens. Other entirely different matter was spy a council of Apocalypse and his Horsemen. If they found her, they'd be blistered to her bones swiftly, and no one would know ever.

No, that was untrue. They would interrogate to Scott later on, and perhaps find out he was in cahoots with her. And then they would get him executed. And it would be her blame.

But discover their evil schemes, their machinations, their war plans, could be worth of the risk.

She wasn't such of a fool to think she could run the risk of using her telepathy without being detected, but there were ways and methods craftier. So she was being conniving and creative.

The place was well secured, and using her psychic powers was out of question. However she had studied painstakingly the plans of the Tower, and had found a blind spot near of the dome. Around the circle there were tall columns built in spiral, winding upwards. And among the twists and curls the spears of metal did, she had found a shaft enough dark and tiny to hide one person, and covered of possible flying spies. Near of it had a hatch used to access to the top of the dome, but the hole was too tiny and was too out of sight to be easily noticed. And she might look over the heads of the upper class of the empire, and listen from that spot the conversations they held. The aloud and strident tone they used to spout their tiresome speeches of arrogance helped a lot to grasp the discussion. Apocalypse and his acolytes were so arrogant and spiteful of the smartness or resources of the enemy they were vain and flaunted, disregarding prudence and wariness. It was a wonder hadn't more leaks of secrets.

She put off her reverie to later, and focused on the conversation, so difficult as Apocalypse was doing that. His speeches of self-worshipping and harvesting of the fit ones were boring and dull. Took job no dozing off. Above all they were all equal, as a droplet to another. She marveled often he didn't record his talks and after turned the tape on whenever he wished to speak. It would be easier.

Although now was happening something out of the script.

She didn't expect Sinister questioned to Apocalypse, and least on his face. He had backed down at once, but the fact remained and was disturbing. Holocaust -the Wanda's slayer- had sneered at him, with a mocking tone with an underlying menace lingering on it. However the moment had passed, and Apocalypse and Holocaust were busy making up and rehearsing their plans, while Abyss was hanging around idly, and Sinister was sulking careful of being unnoticed by the other Horsemen.

Part of her was intrigued about the whereabouts of Mikhail Rasputin and the cause of his lateness, but she was really more drawn into the explication of the war plans. She felt a deep chill biting her bones and nailing splinters of icy fear in her belly. If they accomplished to carry out that atrocity... if they managed do that... She recalled the smoking ruins America had been turned into after of the War of the Ascension, and the daily horrors performed there, and imagined it spread to the remainder world. She shuddered. They had to impede it, but... How? Scott and she couldn't warn to Magneto, Logan and the rest. They couldn't release a prisoner and entrust him or her with that mission. Mainly because wasn't guaranteed the poor soul didn't run away right after.

She went on scrutinizing the scene unfolding beneath her, lurching in her shelter, and meditated in the words and facts and vibes she was sensing even with her telepathy repressed. Sinister was turning out to be unpredictable, having expressed openly his dislike and after concealing it, and could become a loose cannon, an unreliable nuisance. Still was the Apocalypse's Heir, that golden armor restraining a burning furnace of hot-melting flames, who was giving her a curious misgiving. Her instincts were screaming her for some reason. She was next to sure he possessed an agenda of his.

Apocalypse had mustered to his generals before the final raid, but she was sensing his plans and ideals weren't followed very faithfully. Sinister had his own ideas about this, Mikhail hadn't showed up, Holocaust kept back his own secret intentions, she was certain of it, and Abyss simply didn't matter it.

Separated we shall fall apart, she mused joyously. Yes, hide here was risky, but she was learning plenty. And their stupid overestimation of their powers and their neglect of the imagination, creativity and intelligence provided an extra helping. The only single thing they understood -except Sinister- was the violence and the physical strength. Stealth and cleverness weren't qualities they granted some worth.

All other than Sinister, and she guessed that was the reason he had favored so handsomely to Scott.

Scott said his advantage wasn't the optic beams his eyes poured but his wits, his tactical ability: he saw and thought different than the rest. Patterns of space and movement were carved in his memory as a red brand, and his mind related elements apparently opposite or irreconcilable, and made plans and strategies instantly. It was his greatest asset, what had won countless battles through America.

Smartness, craftiness, slyness, subtlety, whatever you wished call it, were little valued in that accursed of God stronghold, and few possessed them, too fond and obsessed in raw strength and brutality. And it might be their downfall at the end.

*********************************************************************************

The round and majestic globe of the full moon glittered hung on the nightly sky, glistening with silvery moonlight, casting its pale rays over the Earth and bathing it with a snowy, soft glimmer. The aura of the satellite dulled the milky path of stars dotted the black canvas enveloping half planet.

He let the whitish beams stroked his face and dallied with his silvery hair. He liked stargazing. It was an acquired habit throughout his long years. Since the Camp, since Auschwitz, when he stared up to the stars, pleading the release of that death in life, and screaming in defy against a God who had given up them. When the war was over, he gazed still at them, asking why he survived and his entire family not. Since then, each time a fundamental, shaker of his foundations, change happened in his life, he contemplated the stars, looking for an answer never came.

Like twenty years ago. For once the stars had given him the answer.

He remembered steadily the words of his greatest friend in the world: Any dream worth of having is a dream worth of striving for, because you can't imagine the difference a dream can do.

Indeed, he couldn't have imagined it.

He stared the dazzling shining of the stars and the titillating glow of the moon, and briefly wondered what he would be doing if his friend had survived. And how would the stars be?

For once, he had got his answer. And he hated it. The popular wisdom was right. Ignorance was blessing.

"My God, Charles. Is that the reason you died for? You had to perish so I realized of the wrong of my ways? Did you relinquish your life to save my soul?"

"Love"

That simple statement cut off his monologue, and he turned around slowly. Rogue was over there, peering at him with extreme worrying creasing her features. She had, obviously, heard his voice, listened the racked with pain, anguished tone of his reverie.

"All are over the courtyard, Erik. Peter, Kitty... Gambit and the rest... are awaiting you talk to them."

He felt the urge of stare at the floor. He was feeling really gloomy. "Do they consider me their leader yet?"

"They have never quitted of doing it... Although they can't help to wonder about the curses of the foreigner" She stepped forward firmly, approaching towards him and grabbing a handful of his crimson cloak, like willing to give him reassurance. "He called you criminal, murderer... But it isn't true. Never mind what he gets stuck in his head."

He pulled in himself to the only woman he had loved after of Magda, and squeezed her in his strong arms, needing, yearning the soothing warmth, the tender passion and sincere love she offered freely. One he wasn't sure of deserving anymore.

"His memories... You saw them too." He muttered. His throat was dry and cracked. He hesitated, fearing it might to break. "Memories of a world such unlike this... Where the X-Men and me, where you and me..."

"They weren't real, Erik. Everything we saw... were nothing but a dream" She protested, screwing shut her eyes, wishing being so sure as her voice suggested.

He paused, and tilted his head over her, resting his chin on her forehead. "If it was, was fascinatingly familiar. But neither mine, nor of the foreigner."

He straightened his body, feeling his body taken over by a resolution more unbending the metal he ruled over, the same fervor and unyielding, unbeatable will had gathered and held to the X-Men during years of war, losses and pain.

"Let's go" He whispered. "There are many tasks to be done."

He ushered her at the house, resting a hand on her shoulder. She nodded, averting her sorrowful, tear-filled eyes away him. The charming was shattered.

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Several figures were standing on the lobby. Waiting. Anticipating. Nerves oozed distress and fear in the semi-darkness of the room.

A door opened and whirled ninety degrees with a creak of his old and rusty hinges, displaying to Magneto and Rogue standing on the threshold. Even in those quizzical circumstances, the leaders of the Rebellion managed being commanding and imperious.

Magneto bore his cobalt, electrifying eyes on each one of the gathered, looking over them. His son Pietro, Gambit, Nightcrawler, Piotr and Kitty, Weapon-X and Psylocke. His piercing pupils inspected to each one of them, assessing their state, judging their readiness to the impossible labor he'd demand, and pondering with chagrin what he was about of asking of them. He was asking them to die.

Later he would be talking heartily with the members of the team, but he now needed bid very particular and definite orders.

"Pietro!" He called. "After of this meeting gather to the X-Men available in the Situation Room. I... shall need talk with them. I must also explain the next mission: the evacuation of thousands of humans in Maine. We shall wait though for the return of Blink and Sunfire of their quest before making specific arrangements. Whatever Holocaust is up, can't be by any means good."

His son nodded. "Understood, Father."

Magneto whirled at Piotr and his wife. He was with his arms flexed to both sides of the body, and seemed anxious, tense. Kitty perused the floor while lit up a cigarette, but the futile gesture, the dim light and the rivulets of smoke didn't cloak her nerves. "Colossus, Shadowcat, you will go back to Colorado, with your students and prepare them while await my coming. They must be ready to be mobilized in any moment."

The wedded pair nodded numbly. When Magneto turned at other, the Kitty's hand traveled up, towards the bulky, broad Piotr's arm. Her fingers lingered on the bands of smooth metal, with the ridges and curves of the powerful muscles. He clasped her hand and squeezed gently.

"Kurt, you will travel to Avalon and look for the woman named Destine. I require she opens my eyes, and confirms or denies the Bishop's message. To that end, you mother will meet with you."

Kurt stalled his time before answering, supported on the floor with his four limbs. He had doubts about that man called 'Bishop', and plenty more about that plan. Yet he wasn't going to argue publicly with his leader and founder. He'd express his doubts in private, later. "Ja, sir."

Magneto faced to the tall and slim man dressed in soiled clothes and a tattered trenchcoat, resting nonchalantly on the wall. The thief was glancing down diffidently, apparently oblivious or unaffected for the tension surrounding him. However the noncommittal way he was lightning up his cigarette, with an artificial lowering of head to dodge his pupils, and the stealth glances he was shooting him were treacherous telltales of the nervousness and the fear were gripping him. He couldn't hide it to Magneto, his former best friend, with those cold and half-lidded eyes. Piercing and charming eyes framed with disheveled brown hair, beaming on a face of exquisitely chiseled features had scared him once upon a time, when Rogue hadn't given away the person who really held her heart, her passion and her devotion.

Gambit was deadly still, and for once the cynical, sardonic smirk beaming on his face was off. His chest swelled slowly with a slow intake of air. This could be difficult. He had called him for a specific mission required his talents but now it was put indefinitely in hold, in favor of saving the universe.

"Gambit, let me be blunt and go to the point" He blurted. "I need you and your Externals travel to the most faraway edge of the universe to steal a jewel is the focus point of all the realities, thus I can use it to remake the reality."

Gambit blinked. "Right. No problem." He mumbled, sizing him with a glazed stare usually reserved to lunatics. "And exactly how do you plan we do the trip?"

"Lila is an alpha-level teleporter. She can open a spatial wormhole to any area of the cosmos."

"Oh, yes, sure." He retorted, shaking his cigarette to drop the ash. Magneto disregarded his obvious expression of disbelief. He knew Remy LeBeau wouldn't disappoint him when the time came.

"Weapon-X" He enunciated. "You'll travel to Europe to hand over to the Council the information Sinister volunteered us so kindly. You will help with the evacuation from the outside. Psylocke will go along with you to aid in your task. She knows Europe and will serve of liaison with the Council."

Logan growled in agreement. Psylocke closed her purple eyes in torment, not looking forward to see to his brother, and acquiesced with a nod.

Pietro raised his hand. "Permission to speak freely, sir"

"Permission granted. Tell me, Pietro."

"Is wise Elisabeth departs with Logan? She is making great progresses with Miss Dane. Separate them now, in the middle of the treatment-"

"Son" He interrupted softly. "I understand your concerns and accept your viewpoint. Nevertheless, I dread a comparative and eyeful look to the bigger picture does it nonsensical. I know it comes out hugely callous and harsh, but it is unfortunately true. Nowadays we must run the risk and pray for the best."

Quicksilver bit his lip without replying anything. Magneto acknowledged he was partially right, but he was helpless. Elisabeth could assist to Logan in Europe, and he missed work with a telepath. She was the most proper to back him.

And still he would rather Psylocke kept on healing the brain damage of the green-haired woman. She was awakening of the haze numbing her senses and wreaking havoc into her mind, but she wasn't ready altogether to go on her own. The woman still hesitated whether he was or wasn't her father, and often went out of her way to avoid to Rogue. His wife, who dodged her frequently, shared that feeling of dread and pain, and that drive to run away. When Magneto decided she joined to the Quicksilver team, nobody was surprised.

He looked over to his warriors. They were more than soldiers, they were friends, practically family. And he was sending them in suicide missions, one after other. Because in the deepest of his heart, he knew even if they triumphed over insurmountable obstacles, the exit of his missions and the survival through them would guarantee their demises.

But maybe they could obtain a free life in that new world, a blank slate to write down their own and bright destine. And that hope bolstered up him.

The final stage of the game he had spent twenty years playing was nearing, he could feel it. Floating on the air, whispering in his ears, crawling under his skin, bristling to every strand of hair.

The last movement between Apocalypse and him was about of beginning. But this time he would win the game, and Apocalypse would be powerless to stop him. He'd kick the board before the game started ever, and would fix it with new pieces, which would be set in their proper places when his enemy tries to arise, to annihilate him once and for all.

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End of the Part Two.

Final Notes: Yes, I know Blink was with the team in Seattle in X-Men Alpha, but bear with me. Besides, this is AU. By the way, I don't want anybody thinks I hate to Alex Summers for his portrait here. He's a cool character, but this is the Age of Apocalypse. And in that timeline, our lovely, bouncy blue-eyed beast is a sick and psychopath bastard, whereas Sabretooth behaves as a human being.

This has been shorter than I had planned beforehand, but I think it can stand alone without further additions. Or with a good trimming and perhaps some extra scene, or elaborating better some. Feel free to opine.

Thank very much for the reviews. Keep on sending. And to Optic Red: I know I commit mistakes; I warned of it. I always use a spell and grammar check, but it doesn't find every of them. I try improving, nevertheless. And by the way, your 'Optic Evolution: Ruby Quartz' liked me a lot. Especially with the references to the original comics and the early nineties animation series.

In the next part, Weapon-X and Psylocke arrive to Europe to conference with the Human Council, and Betsy is reunited with a Brian Braddock very different. Meanwhile, the defection and runaway of Sinister speeds up the events on the pens. Cyclops and Marvel Girl investigate in secret as Havok looks for a noose to tie around his brother's neck.


	3. Plans and Conspiracies

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Age Of Apocalypse: Shifting Times

Author: Jenskott

Summary: What if had Weapon-X not rescued to Jean Grey out of the pens?

Notes: Here I explain why Betsy owns the Kwannon's body. It's based on the rules about AOA characters and my own idea: Tony Stark never became IronMan. Hence nobody stood up to The Mandarin. By the way: Fasten your belts up! The Armageddon begins here!

Rating: PG-13.

Disclaimer: Sadly they belong to Marvel Comics.

Feedback: To jorgisimox@hotmail.com. Very cherished and appreciated and beloved. However English isn't my native language, therefore forgive my very obvious mistakes. Still I'll thank polite advice.

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Part Three. Plans and Conspiracies-

A cloak of bright red bleached the sky in broad daylight as an evil paint made of blood over a vast canvas. The sunrays pierced the layers of oily clouds of smog and pollution. They lightened up the red blanket and cast a crimson and glittery glow on her pale skin.

London wasn't quite like she remembered it.

Elisabeth Braddock disregarded her sad and mournful reverie, hiding the heartbreak had sprung from her homesickness, from her longing for matching her wistful memories with the harsh reality. It was a throbbing ache, a grief gripping her heart and flaying her soul deep down, but she wasn't allowed show it right now. All in all, she needed her most professional demeanor to the clash of wills was starting.

"Betsy, meet with the Trasks" Logan introduced her "The most resentful item of the Council. It's been a while, Moira."

"No quite, Logan." The Scottish scientific spat, her already sourly mood bitterer with the harsh and mean treatment, very accurate on the other hand.

When Logan and she reached Bristol's seaport received promptly a warm welcome of the first group of thugs they ran into. After of the subsequent and brief scuffle, took little effort and less threats of intense and prolonged agony to convince to the would-be bullies of lead them to the Council HQ. Unfortunately the reception in there was even warmer and more heartfelt than in the decks. Yes, she was being petty and sarcastic. It was too obvious?

And right there they were now. Within a massive domed chamber illuminated with the light filtered the stained glass of the exaggerated skylight, and facing the Human Council. The remainder members, clad in their tight yellow suits, were granting them hostile and distrustful peers, but no as bitter as Moira. Or that well-built and handsome blonde man for that matter. That man so painfully familiar to her.

Bolivar and Moira Trask, the Sentinel makers; Emma Frost, former White Queen of the Inner Circle of the Hellfire Club, before that shadow government was obliterated by Apocalypse, Shaw became one of the Madri's lapdogs, and Donald Pierce was twisted in a repugnant blend of circuitry; Mariko Yoshida, sister of Sunfire, the last hero of a country wiped off the planet; ex-General Thunderbolt Ross, high command of an army no longer existed; and Brian Braddock.

She curled her lip and bit it. Her teeth drew blood, but it didn't matter. That stinging, cutting pain was meant to dull another deepest ache, tearing inside her. Still she forced to herself to sport a good-natured, optimistic mask of joy and confidence on her countenance while Logan finished the introductions.

She perused with measuring attention to each member of the Council, trying assessing their natures and tempers, knowing their strengths and weaknesses, guessing possible leverages and wholly intending analyzing them to find out blackmail methods if it was needed. She scrutinized them with the eyes of her face and her mind, probing for useful knowledge, when she found a hardened barrier of resistance. She felt the softest feather-like stroke of a telepath brushing against other telepath, smooth and menacing. Electricity sparked between her purple eyes and the cold blue irises of Frost. The lobotomized psychic shot her a cursory, narrowed glare, but said nothing. However Betsy read her knowing expression of respect and defiance.

Their blades had parried for first time.

Keeping carefully her mask of naive and innocent unconcern, she glanced away to the lean and short Asian woman. She was hurling stealth peeps at Logan, and Betsy read sparks of something. There was an underlying attraction, a desire nearly subconscious in her. Interesting. Filing that information to later use, she strode forward. She had been entrusted with an obligation to carry out. A message to deliver.

She approached to Mariko and bowed with painstaking, respectful protocol. "Good morning, Lady Mariko. Your cousin Shiro wishes send his best and fondest regards."

The petite woman gasped. "Do you... know to my brother?"

"Yes, I do indeed." She took delicately her hand and closed her eyes. A purple blaze flared in her forehead.

A river of images flowed in Mariko's mind. Ravenous flames swallowing Japan, with rows of Infinites advancing over charred corpses and annihilated cities. Sunfire unleashing the atomic fire throbbing in him and incinerating hundred of soldiers. Holocaust beating him after of a terrible battle. The awful Apocalypse's visage while his claw clamped around his face and scarred it, shortly before of sinking him in the blood pool where he swam. The salty taste of the thick fluid while he drowned, impregnating his body forever with the stench and staining his skin with the blood the murderers had spilled between laughs.

The awakening to the nightmare of the failure to his country and family, to the shame of keeping alive and without honor. The jail. The repugnant genetic experiments in The Moon. The final freedom thanks to the X-Men. The ruthless and eternal fight against Apocalypse, searching regaining the lost honor and saving millions of lives of other massacres. And the last message to his cousin, the last member left of his family, since he didn't expect really survive.

"Farewell, Mariko. Take care of yourself. And I wish Emma-O*, the Judge of the Dead, sends us to a place better than this world, where we can meet without any regrets to what could have been and wasn't."

She blinked, and suddenly she was again in the HQ, with the members of the Council. The message had finished.

Wetness moistened her eyes and cheeks. Tears. She realized with shock she had been weeping. With a sad gesture, she wiped out the tears and wet trails with her sleeve and glanced to Psylocke. The woman sported a forlorn countenance matched the powerful sorrow and grief coloring her face.

The woman bowed. "Thanks very much, Miss Elisabeth. I'm truly thanked. By the way, forgive my curiosity, but are you Japanese like myself?" She queried, scolding mercilessly in her mind for her indiscretion. However she hadn't seen any compatriot long ago, and her feelings of loneliness and exclusion were very strong and intense. And that woman not only seemed Asian, but also was dressed with a ninja garb, and blended a Japanese accent in her perfect English language.

"Forgive me, Lady Yoshida, but I'm afraid I'm not Japanese, or Asian for that matter. I'm quite English, born in the family Braddock" She tilted her head at Brian, fluttering her eyelashes in a mocking, infuriating manner. "It's been a long while, Brian. How are you doing it, brother?" She chirped.

He crossed his arms and huffed, ticked off with the presumption of that woman. "I don't know what are you trying pulling here, miss, but my sister was born in England, and is English such like myself. You DON'T seem exactly British."

"Long history" Betsy glowered. "Let's tell 'Perilous Siege' and leave it in it. Besides, I can prove beyond any doubt I'm Elisabeth Braddock."

"Seriously? How?"

"Crab. Underpants. Girlish scream. Sounds it familiar?" Brian cringed. "So I thought."

Logan blinked. "Did you place a crab in his boxers?" He stuttered.

A bored shrug. "Yes, but it was fair pay back. He burst a water balloon on my white blouse in the school only because I fed to the dog with his homework. Fair revenge for the banana peel on the stairs."

The entire Council stared at Braddock. Their amazement grew even more when they saw his flushing face. He squirmed uncomfortably, meeting extremely uneasy under the scrutiny of those gaping, bewildered and even bemused expressions. That woman had managed simple-handily embarrass him publicly. Only one person in the whole planet could accomplish that feat, and it only should confirm the claims of that person.

Determined to regain the upper hand in that argument, Brian snorted contemptuously and lifted up his chin, giving a haughty glance to the X-Woman. "It doesn't prove anything at all, woman. A telepath as yourself may easily read those memories in someone else's mind. But I relent; perhaps you are Elisabeth Braddock. But even if you are she, you aren't my sister. No longer. I'm no relative of any filthy mutant-"

A whip-like swish sounded, slicing the air.

A muffled and sickening crunch followed after.

The booming and swift slap echoed across the dome.

He hadn't got to end the sentence. His head reeled sideways, and he felt his cheek burning. Perhaps she had broken some bone. Such vicious rage clashed wrong with his erstwhile tranquil and demure sister.

"How do you dare, Brian?" She roared with venomous fury seeping in her voice. One of her hands grabbed a fistful of his shirt and other closed around of his neck. She lifted him with little effort, displaying an awesome and unexpected strength. "Have you forgotten who saved you when our elder brother went nuts? Have you forgotten whose temple was scratched with a bullet was headed at you? Have you forgotten who crumbled Jamie's mind in smithereens to save your life? And have you forgotten ever where our father was born? Where did he come from? Would you mind terribly if I comment it to the Council?"

"That is..." He wheezed "Fool and absurd gossip. Meaningless rumors with no fundament. I'm surprised you truly believe something of that rubbish."

His sister let go abruptly his hold, letting him drop on the floor. His rear plopped down with noise and stirring dust clouds, and he stayed quiet down there, gasping eagerly for air. His hand rubbed slowly his sore neck, reddened with claw-like marks.

"Please!" Betsy drawled, wiggling her forefinger in a singsong, scornful manner. "Not even you believe in your own words, brother. Before of lying to someone try and sound minimally convinced of your own speech." 

Logan -and the remainder Councilors- witnessed the bizarre exchange with dumbfounded and genuinely intrigued stares. What do you mean with that, Psylocke? Weapon-X asked mentally, knowing he sounded a tad too curious and prying, but unable of acting otherwise.

She turned at him and winked. Let's say, Logan, I haven't a big trouble believing the Bishop's words. No knowing the things I know

Outside of the dome far above of the buildings and the Big Ben with the clock shattered, a icy and brisk wind whistled and hissed, and clouds rolled along the sky with it. A tempest was brewing. Slowly.

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Jean Grey typed letters and digits frenziedly on the screen of the computer she was facing. Swift fingers rushed on the keyboard while her focus was intensely drawn in the monitor. The soft radiance reflected on her green irises and the tedious beeping were definitively dull, but nothing might take her concentration away this.

Use the computer to look over and snoop about the system and the files was chancy, but no compromising while she kept to herself within the boundaries of her clearance. And a prelate's clearance -she spat spitefully every time she thought that loathsome title was linked to her name- opened many doors. No all, however. And she'd need to wade in dangerous waters to find the information she required.

Sometimes when she checked over the computer mainframe marveled examining and studying the complexity and sheer craftsmanship of the system. This technology was unlike of anything else existent on the Earth. Only in Wundagore she had found machinery in a comparable development stage, and it was light years from this. Apocalypse had used those tools to pounce on a clueless planet, and conquering it. She ignored where came the machines from, but Scott had mentioned something about alien origin once. She supposed it made as much sense as anything else did.

In those moments she couldn't help think about Kate. Yes, she had wished many times the girl could get her grabby hands on these computers, or at least steal something. She was an intelligent and creative woman, with an uncanny knack to the computer science, overzealous and eager of learning of it. Unfortunately the technology was strictly limited to the upper commands of the Throne, and outright forbidden to humans. Still Shadowcat was very creative, and with the little equipment Magneto lend her, she could fix any mess. She was a hacker far better than her, and could spy in the private files smoothly and unnoticed without every the difficulties and trials she ran into constantly.

Jean bit her lip, observing the lock banning her from the war plans. Her hand stroked her chin in deep reflection while she thought some way to crack the shell and download the files. The core of the trouble was giving her a throbbing headache, a very bad thing to a telepath. She could find the way of retrieving the information, cover her tracks and beat a hasty retreat, and even discover the cryptographic code to decipher it and record it. But and afterwards? Still she had to figure out how those data would make some good. How might they send them to the resistance safely?

She was sat down, with the hand cupping her chin in contemplative stance, perusing the renegade computer, when the creak of a door opening echoed behind her.

Jean whirled on her chair to face the newcomer, her partner since years ago. It was interesting and telltale notice the change produced on him when Scott was left alone, was closed in his flat, or was in some place where he felt sure and trusty. His shoulders slumped, his head downcast, his tired pace and his stance grief-stricken and beaten were things his subordinates would never see. No in several lifetimes.

By some reason she wasn't willing analyze, was flatterer he decided she was worth of his confidence and trust. She felt glad and pleased thinking he believed in her enough to let down the masks set to his self-protection.

"What has happened today?" She asked solicitously, raising a concerned brow at his thoroughly gloomy expression. She disregarded query 'How was your day?' or 'How are you feeling?' always because except for odd and seldom exceptions, the answer was the same day after day.

But his negative feelings were particularly pernicious and foul right now. Ripples of darkness with purple highlights, progressively becoming ebony pitch-black with a tinge of red. Something was poisoning him from within. She had become very familiar with his little gestures and grimaces and knew he was simmering with fury and scorn led to himself. And today he was really glum and sourly.

She shut down her laptop and sauntered with calculated serenity towards him.

Tough day in the job, uh?

Is it so obvious?

When they were parted no more than two steps, the doors snapped shut, curtains were suddenly drawn and blinds went down, and lights switched off at their own volition. The room was plunged in darkness, thick and impermeable shadows shrouding them.

Both of them were sure of Havok, Chief of Security after all, had scattered gadgets such like mikes and cameras about the entire Tower. Thus they had set up in the rooms of Scott electronic devices detected the wavelengths, scrambling them and disrupting them. However they couldn't be too much careful. Couldn't be allowed any interaction between them was recorded, and the jeopardizing and compromising talks were made telepathically.

Jean felt a weird sensation when she forged a permanent path linking their minds together and allowing to theirs thoughts flow and travel up and down it. She regretted with remorseful guilt having established a mindlink with another man, and regretted with rueful chagrin it felt so nice. Good. Right. Oh no, she hadn't said that. Still it was the only way to keep in permanent check at each other, and to avoid malicious eavesdroppers. So she had opened a bond between their brains, a link couldn't be broken, shielded from other telepaths. And she has grudgingly to admit it liked her. Share her thoughts with that man, feel and see and touch his darkness, bask in his light and nurture it with her own... It was exhilarating.

He started to mind-speak with that reposed, vibrant voice of his There was a fleeing. We chased them. My impulsive and hotheaded brother threw a tantrum and killed to several, including one who I was trying submit. Later I had deal with those brats of Guthrie and his sister, eager of being a prelate only for boasting and tyrannize to someone else. Have I added I was putting up with Beast afterwards?

She kept quiet and still, hearing mentally his stark descriptions, and sensing the bare force of his emotions leaking at her. Grief, despair, sorrow, bitterness, self-loathing. All tainting his mind and his anguished thoughts with a murky hue. It was nearly overwhelming, but she had got used to it.

The redhead telepath hugged him, enclosing his upper body with her arms. A gesture of closeness, of comfort, of relief. It was the most tender display of affection she -both- dared to use with each other. And it felt nice. Good. Even right. Like her or not, and the guilt was eating her many times, his arms felt to her a shelter in the darkness. In that piece of the Hades where she lived he was an island, a solid ground where put her feet. Lose it would be equivalent to lose her footing and be carried away. He was someone stable and reliable, her bulwark, her rock, her anchor.

Jean sent happy, optimistic thoughts towards him. Fire to melt the ice, light to flare in the darkness, warmth to ease his tears. Following her purpose of getting him relaxed, her hands lingered softly on the golden shoulder straps of the body suit, before of unfastening the clasps and detaching them off the body. The twin pieces dropped down with a low clinking. And she began to open the rest of the armor.

Holy God, Jean He whispered, invoking an entity which he no longer believed in, a deity had forsaken and forgotten to its own sons Who am I trying kidding? I'm trying releasing prisoners on one hand, and on the other I prevent escapes. People has dead today because I couldn't impede my brother and some cocky prelates went over their heads again. I'm such fucking mess

You're doing what you can for helping, Scott She mused You've already done much for the prisoners, giving them a chance. You've shown concern for them, and it is pretty more than nobody have given them here by far Jean frowned, pondering about that hell-bound pit. She hated with everlasting passion that den of devils, and prayed for they fled sooner or later. Together and alive.

Meanwhile the last segment of metallic protection rebounded on the carpet. She was extremely aware of his close body, the warm flowing from him, the enthralling glow of his red visor on the darkness, the way the thin fabric clung to his skin, the tact of the bothersome kevlar between her fingers and his broad chest. Even submerged in bowels of blackness she could sense the soft heaves and lowers of the thorax and make out the shape, form and outline of his body and ogle to the ripples of his muscles under the skin, as waves on the liquid water.

Unbidden, forbidden thoughts crept in her mind. She shook her head to banish them, being careful of blocking them, and forced her head alongside other thought line.

I've been trying unlocking the files but there hasn't been luck so far. No mention I'm not sure of what doing of them She reported, summoning her most professional demeanor Have you found out anything worth today, Scott?

He sighed, and Jean felt the inner weariness and despair this endless and endlessly stupid conflict was giving him. It was wearing him down, rendering him fed up and depressed. His earlier outburst just mirrored the exhaustion he was basking in. His desperate hopes in making a difference to some people, his doubts regarding his capability and worth, and his fears about his own uselessness at the end.

Magneto is up to something. Yet when isn't he? Seemingly the Gambit's group and him broke into a top-secret underground room and kicked up a racket in it before vanishing. Meanwhile Nightcrawler has departed towards Avalon, with three Pale Riders and the Shadow King on his trail. That bodiless freak warned though of someone surfing psychically in the files of Core Portland. And I'd wager it's related

And the remainder X-Men?

Out to hinder or spoil the culls in Indiana and Maine. Oh, and Sinister remains cut off still. I'm sure he's disappeared without a trace for now, and is plotting some scheme against Apocalypse, but I ignore what can be in his mind. Like always His arms raised and threaded along his long strands of brown hair.

Jean's heart had fluttered, only for a moment. She thought he was going to embrace her back. Noticing it, the woman chastised to herself.

My instincts are screaming at me every those incidents are factors add on and are part of the great picture. Something is happening. I can say it. Something very big and awesome. I can see the storm brewing in the horizon, ready to blow up. I can feel it. And we're in danger of it blowing up us in smithereens

He sighed again, staring fixedly at her. Jean knew the tender, troubled glance he was giving her, even with the damned visor in the way, and she felt his concern and anxiety and fright streaming towards her as a flood. He was truthfully and appallingly worried for her, sick with the dread of her trapped in the middle of the tempest his senses foretold.

Perhaps would be better you fly off now, Jean. We are for a long ride. But you have other places where you can go to and hide or live

She denied with her head. No. I promised you I'd stay with you, and I honor my promises. I'm sticking with you for the better and the worse, till the death if it is what is waiting for us at the end

She stated seriously, locking stares with him to show she was serious. A tiny part of her mind wondered why those words had come to her tongue so easily. She remembered have them heard as part of a speech when she was a child, but wasn't sure of recalling the meaning.

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Elisabeth Guthrie nursed carefully her arm, still feeling the remaining tingle of the hot tissue scar. His fingers grazed slightly the spot, a patch of skin of a clearer shade, and lingered on it. She retreated at once the hand, wincing with the itching of the blister.

With a resentful huff she tossed backwards her ponytail, a gesture of cool contempt wasn't so convincing in its indifference as she'd like. The little blonde bitch was vicious with her plasma bombs, she bristled. During the intended outbreak, humans and renegade mutants had collaborated together to escape, something unbelievable by any reckoning. She was unprepared when that lass of blonde curls -roughly the Sam's age- had unleashed a barrage of projectiles of energy on her. The rain of fire burst along her mass singing and searing her skin, and eliciting howls out of her throat. Despite of her size, she recoiled in defeat, and the things could have got ugly if Sam hadn't cracked the jaw of that little witch.

"It hurts a lot yet, sister?" Sam asked with a crooked grin on his lips. He remained sit down next to her, with his legs tapping idly the floor of the lab. She groaned. Of course he was invulnerable and remained untouched and unharmed when one golden-furred animal of the cages -Feral was her name she thought- attacked him with her claws.

"Yes" She scoffed with little sympathy. He could be her last blood brother, but so was Paige, and either of the soldiers on the Tower would slit their mothers' throat if it earned a promotion. "The bit irks me the most is Summers lectured later on!"

Samuel Guthrie snarled. "So little as like admit it, he had a point. We let prisoners escape during our shift so he telling us off was to be expected." His eyes squinted and his expression turned very, very dark. "Yet no one talks me as that. I'm sick of that sanctimonious bastard and his loads of crap."

"I agree." Her sister nodded. They continued their baleful and resentful conversation when the voices sounding across the lab raised in volume, drawing their attentions. Behind of the metallic door, opened and left ajar, two distinct voices were filtering to the rest of the quarters.

"What will be Summers talking about with McCoy?"

Sam shrugged. "I don't know. But knowing to Havok he must be bargaining his support to get rid of Summers and get the command."

Elisabeth sneered wickedly. "It wouldn't be sad. If the Chief of Security comes by and asks my help, I'm giving it for free."

Cannonball wiped some stray bangs away his square forehead, and stared down at his little sister. "Don't be silly, Betts. You would give it for nothing. If he wants us, he will must give us something in return."

While the Guthrie siblings argued, Alex Summers was busy glancing with a mixture of scorn and sickness to the gruesome form of McCoy, hunched over one table. It wasn't a sight he enjoyed specially, but it beat the alternative: look around of the chamber of tortures he jokingly labeled 'lab room'.

From the high ceiling hang nondescript persons, duly shackled and gagged, writhing or shaking with frenetic, compulsory motions. Likely they were staring down, on the several stretchers where were laid corpses drugged, maimed, dissected or with their bellies sliced open in order to see, catalogue and poke their innards. There weren't spare body pieces at any surface, though. Blots of coagulated blood caking the sheets and chunks of flesh or shards of bone were found everywhere, but the big organic rests and valuable 'specimens' were dipped on the genetic soup Beast stored in the massive pots and tubes where he concocted his failures and successes in genetic engineering.

Even with the hardened training and the little regard towards someone else's lives Alex possessed and gloated about, that cold lab and his fetid stench had pernicious effects to his stomach permanently.

McCoy had mocked of his displays of revolting repugnance when he sank several mutants on his viscous tube, but he was convinced of science had nothing to see with the way Beast skinned and dissected bodies. He was a natural sadistic to put it simple. It wasn't he minded him, of course. If McCoy supported him, Alex couldn't care him less how many useless wastes of DNA he butchered on a daily basis.

"How was telling, McCoy" He uttered, not watching the next human bodies being liquefied on the bubbling liquid, and dissolving in that blend of proteins "My brother seems worried: His reflexes are dulled, his decisions are arguable. Like scientific, you know the change is inevitable."

It was short and ambiguous, but the underlying meaning was clear and unmistakable. Hank McCoy took off slowly his orange lenses, and stared straight at Havok.

The Prelate suffered inner tremors each time he gazed upon that beast-like face. It upset him; its long and glinting fangs jutting out of his wide maw of thick lips, its blank eyes of pale yellow color, and its unruffled strands of grey fur cascading around his face and darkening it as a cowl.

"Hypothetically speaking, I shall support to whoever allows me to pursue my investigation" His thick brows frowned with a scowl, giving to his inhuman face a most sinister looking. "And you should keep in mind Sinister esteems greatly to your brother. He won't agree gleefully a fratricide."

Alex waved one hand derisively. "That is of no consequence."

McCoy scoffed, looking back to his control pad. The tank was laden with aminoacids and they needed his careful attention to evolve. "If that's all, Prelate..."

"It's. Good-bye, McCoy." Alex spun around and dashed off, away that place. The reek of the blood and the death was beginning to adhere to his clothes and hair, and the chemicals hurt his nostrils. He had better places where getting a good time than in the Beast's lair, but before of visiting Heaven a perfumed bath was in order.

*********************************************************************************

Starlight radiance was converted in heated plasma and channeled towards one hand. Power coursed up the arm, gathering among the fingers in pulsating ripples of incredibly hot energy.

"Watch your mouth, Aaronson" Havok growled, clenching his fist. Energy crackled on it. "If you insinuate I'm mating with a flatscan, you have better be ready to defend to yourself."

The lanky black man crouched slightly, preparing only in case. Alex was infamous by his uncontrollable outbursts of fury. The larger of the two brothers stepped in the middle, trying placating to Alex.

Scott snorted. Behind of his shades he was studying the erratic loops of a gnat fluttered aimlessly on the filthy air. It turned out to be one most interesting experience than that pathetic show, he decided.

Jean, who stood by behind him, sneered disdainfully at the scene with just the same spite. Her mesmerizing eyes rolled up, locked in one passing cloud of smog. Can you smell the testosterone floating on the air? She sent telepathically. The sourly and scornful countenance at her face was belied by the humorous ring of that witticism.

Don't kidding He answered briskly I'm yearning for grabbing his lapels and tell him only for the shock value that the Aaronsons know, the Guthries know, the Bedlams know, you know, I know, Sinister knows... Crap, I suspect even Apocalypse knows

And why don't you do?

What purpose would serve it? Give him a seizure aside, of course He rebuked. Scott coughed meaningfully, earning everyone's attention. All whirled at him, and the Prelate looked over them with one of his grim, steeled expressions. The two brothers shifted uneasy and uncertain of what looking forward, and Alex plainly glanced at him.

"If you are done now, let's go." He ordered, and started his pace. Jean followed him closely, and the entire pack trailed behind them.

They marched steadily across bridges and staircases, surrounded by barren and sterile walls of metal, with tall domes of titanium or reinforced glass above and big pits below. The Tower not only grew skywards, but also had more sub-levels, basements and underground facilities than they knew. Jean sometimes stared down towards the abyss and saw the rooms and chambers winding down as a spiral staircase plunging in the darkness of the Earth core. In that place was where listen the cacophony of screams and wails of tortured prisoners was particularly appalling and horrific.

At the same time as they walked, started to be evident where they were leading at. Still, the three Prelates striding on the rearguard were nervous and curious of the Scott's behavior and the reason after it. But while Terry and Jesse Aaronson knew better that get relentless or prod to his chief, Alex was feeling impatient and ticked off. And he never practiced the philosophy of claming up his mouth and waiting to the proper time to speak aloud.

"Where are we going at, brother?" He growled. Scott didn't turn to answer.

"Oh, take a wild guess, Alex." Scott muttered with a sniggering mood unusual in him. The Prelate stopped of walking and looked ahead pointedly.

They had reached the foot of a tall flight of wide steps crawled towards two large gates of marble and titanium flanked for wide columns. Cables and wires slithered along the edges of the staircase to climb the wall or coil around the pillars, ascending as far as the ceiling, and invading the chamber through the door head. They were meant to deliver electricity and energy to the Sinister's experiments, but to the visitors reminded of a horde of groveling snakes.

Scott walked steps up, facing to the gate's keeper, a telepath's brain who gazed over all with a watchful eye. It was kept in a bead of glass mounted on a tripod and floating in a bubbling greenish liquid. He was used to it since long ago, but he knew Jean would never feel eased in front of that thing peering at them with a single eye left, attached to the encephalon through the nerve. Of course he was aware she was liable to have ended up in a coffin of glass with a remaining eye dangling in the liquid if he would haven't almost blasted to Dark Beast, so her fear was rather justified.

Oblivious to the all's astonishment, their gasps of amazement and the emotions of Jean –guilty glee amidst the sickness and repugnance- he demanded be allowed the entrance. Unsurprisingly the brain denied it.

Havok crossed his arms and gave him a quizzical look "What is the trouble, Scott? Sinister is a Horseman. He goes and comes around as he pleases him."

Jean craned her neck towards him and answered for Scott. "This is different, Havok. Sinister has shut off the communication. He doesn't answer since days ago."

Havok stiffened And of course you are the only who Scott considered fit of knowing that information. And now you are feeling very proud of tossing that piece of knowledge to us, poor mortals. Isn't it right, stuck-up, obnoxious slut? He balled that thought and hurled it mentally at Jean. She narrowed dangerously her eyes but didn't display further reaction.

Meanwhile Scott was shooting a glare at the guardian and fuming in disappointment. "Terry, I want you shut down to the guardian" He commanded.

"Are you sure, Scott?"

He nodded. "Do it. I assume the full responsibility."

Jean tilted her head towards him. "I can do it too if you want, Scott."

"No. The guardian would sense your telepathic attack and strike back. On the other hand Terry will disable it, disrupting its synapses and scrambling its thoughts. It is surer."

The Aaronson brother glanced nervously to his chief and leaned over the transparent sphere. He frowned in focusing, sending a rush of power. The guardian suddenly felt its mind turned upside down, and before being able of thinking in counterattack, it couldn't think at all. His rationality had collapsed and shattered, and he was lost, ignoring who was, what wanted, which were its orders. Or what meant the 'order' word.

Clicks and raspy noises, of metal scratching metal, echoed in the silence. The locks had been opened, allowing the entrance. It was practically beckoning them.

"Let's go" Scott stated, pushing the panel and disappearing in the inside. The rest kept up with him.

"Only for the record, I'm opposed to this breaking into the Sinister's private rooms" Alex muttered while he went into the wide chamber.

His eyes widened and he gaped. In the background he listened to Scott saying him some off-handed remark. He ignored it, his attention focused in other thing.

The room was fully wrecked.

Expensive equipment had been ripped off its hinges and torn in pieces scattered throughout the ground. Everywhere lay remnants and pieces of keyboards, monitors, computers, machines, lab stuff and several odd engines. Among the identifiable garbage was spread a cover of pebble-like shards of glass and metal, shrapnel of silicon and plastic, and frayed cords of wires. It looked like a hailstorm had rained over the place and carpeted the floor with its ammo. The entire wreckage was bathed with a coat of grey ashes, and the walls were stripped of the metal, with the bare granite blackened. Close inspection revealed the chunks of metal had liquefied and hardened again on the floor, making a rope-like thread bordered the ground. It was obvious a fire had charred the room, and the intense heat had melted the layers of metal armoring the walls.

The sharp gaze of Havok surveyed with an expression of stunned disbelief the room. Over one corner he found a camera dangling from a torn and tattered cord. Finally the wire broke and the device dropped down, the fall smashing it in bits.

The aloud crash snapped to Alex Summers out of his bafflement and frozen disbelief, and unknotted the lump in his throat.

"Who has been able do this? Magneto or one of his traitors?" He glanced pointedly at Jean.

She frowned at him with a sneering curl of her upper lip. "Why the hell are you staring at me, Summers?"

Scott interjected before Alex answered and the situation degenerated absurdly and quickly. "No, it was done by Sinister himself. Now make sense the things he said me. Sinister disagreed openly with Apocalypse, but..." Scott shook his head with abashed countenance "I never thought he would do this."

"You aren't serious!"

The Aaronson brothers exchanged a troubled, hesitant glance. "Fine. If Sinister has abandoned the place, who is in charge?"

"Scott was the Sinister's right-arm. No one knows the pens better than him."

Terry paused, staring silently at his leader, looking forward to his answer. When nothing came, he prodded with a mixture of expectation and wariness. "Scott?"

Cyclops lowered the head with a grim-looking visage. "All right. I'm in charge."

Havok felt burning with hot-melting, uncontrolled rage. His piercing blue eyes narrowed in gleaming slits, and he bore his pupils in Scott with a sideways glare. No if I have anything said on this matter, brother

Abruptly something stepped among his eyes and Scott. Jean Grey glared him back, combing backwards her red hair with one hand, and glowering with acid scorn.

He leered to her balefully. For the last years every time he plotted something against Scott she was always in the middle. Ever since that day when he had accused to Scott and she saved his neck (he wasn't at all convinced of the excuse she spouted, and failed in understanding why Sinister had bought that), Jean Grey had made into a sort of stronghold around of Scott, getting around along with him, following him as his trusty shadow, and protecting him of harm. Any try of his to undermine his brother's authority or rid from him had bumped into her. It crashed perpetually against the seamless shield was Jean Grey.

Other added reason to crush her at the first chance he had, Alex reflected. He had disliked her from first, and he obtained an excuse to increase his hatred when she proclaimed to herself Scott's protector. He would humiliate and get on her knees when all was said and done. She'd weep in pleads, beseeching for his life, and he'd roast her then. Or perhaps he would taste her first before killing her...

Suddenly, a rumbling thunder split the sky outside. Everyone whirled quickly at the direction the booming explosion had shattered the virtual nightly silence.

"What hell was that?"

"An explosion! And it has been very big!"

"It has come from the port! Over there was the Apocalypse's statue!"

"Let's go! Fast!" Scott roared, pivoting over his heels and sprinting towards the double-gate. Everyone dashed off in the wake of his rushed departure.

Jean Grey ran hurriedly at the doors, eager of being near of Scott. Nevertheless, when she was as far as the steps, the telepath turned her head feeling a strange urge. She peered at the darkness of the chamber with painstaking and thorough care, scrutinizing it through the slit revealing the messed ruins.

Because in some place of that den, in some spot, she had sensed residual telepathic energy lingering on the air. Emanations flowing from some cell of that lab, old for now but storing an unheard power, with a resonance and bio-signature very akin to hers. It was familiar and disturbing. But for some unknown motive, Jean felt something bursting and aching in her chest whenever she tuned with it. A weird joy entwined with such strong longing she wished sobbing in sorrow.

Because she sensed a loss she couldn't start to explain.

*********************************************************************************

Thousands of miles of sparkling water and limpid air stretched below and above them. The clear blue of the sky matched oddly with the cerulean color of the sea. Over there the clouds were snowy-white and soft as cotton, and the vast seascape sparkled with glistening sunrays. The scenery was pretty but no so idyllic as could seem. On the high seas the environment wasn't so badly damaged, but the perfectly pristine blue sheet was stained with dark and black blotches, and the smell to salt and water the air dragged was blended with the reek of the oil and the blood.

They were soaring across the majestic ocean to great speed, leaving behind the war-torn Eurasian continent and leading towards the ravaged-war America, sailing along the rippling water mass of the Atlantic Ocean. As long as they rocketed across the liquid landscape, a chilled and cutting wind whipped their bodies. Swirling gales streamed around them, hissing and beating them with tremendous force, constantly menacing with washing them overboard if theirs grips slipped.

"I ought to have got checked my brain."

"Don't be a grouch!"

"I'm not being a grouch. I'm merely stating I should revise my head to find out me how you talked me into this!"

"Come on, Logan! Can you tell me honestly you don't find this funny?"

"Yes, ride on a fucking Sentinel and trip across the Atlantic stuck on its windshield is my lifetime dream!"

The Betsy's voice turned serious "You know we have to help in the evacuation and protect the convoy, Weapon-X. Tag along personally was the only safe way of defending to the lead Sentinel. And this is the only way of traveling. The Council couldn't spare us one puny ship."

"Couldn't or didn't want." He growled in acknowledgement. "Still this is crazy."

"Yes, it's. Your point being?" Psylocke rebuked matter-of-factly, albeit her voice was a shout more than a statement, since the screeching howls of the hurricane battering them made difficult any communication.

A sudden gust of air yanked her purplish mane and slapped her face with it. Uttering an annoyed grunt, the ninja held it with her hand and tucked it in its place. Afterwards she leaned further down, supporting her full weight on the massive head and sticking her whole length on the square-shaped 'skull', just like some reptile would do. Wolverine was squatted beside her, gazing ahead at the skyline, waiting spotting the goal at any time. His claws itched inside his hands, looking forward to the incoming fight.

He was too edgy, though, and he decided to steer his mind out of the mission for the current moment. And the Betsy's crouched position, prone and tense on the robot's nape in resembling of a predator stalking its hunt, was attracting his attention. "You never explained me because you seem Asian being British. Or where you learnt ninja stunts."

She shot at him a sidelong glance, utterly deprecating. "Didn't I do? Intriguing, I must have neglected that clarification for some reason."

"Come on, Psylocke. If you can't trust personal secrets to your partners, how can trust your life in them when the fight starts?"

This time she turned to glare at him furiously. "Has you heard me even pry off details about the Weapon-X Project? Or question your role in the X-Men? Drop it, pal. It has nothing to do with you, and isn't anything nice to think about. And I refuse to do it."

Logan didn't miss the flash of pain twisting her enraged expression. "I'd assumed at the beginning your father could have got some affair, but your brother said earlier that wasn't your real looking-"

A purple light blazed in smoldering pupils "Don't make assumptions will force me to push you out of the Sentinel with the only purpose of finding out how long you last in sinking in the ocean, Logan. This is NOT your business, and it doesn't affect to the mission at all. Therefore, shut up your mouth."

Betsy closed her eyes but was too late for then. The inquisitorial Logan's words had brought back unbidden and unwanted remembrances in her mind. The telepath remembered her bout with The Mandarin, Lord and Ruler of half Asia. She remembered the man had conquered practically with no opposition the East half of the continent, and could become such threat like Apocalypse. She remembered the most awful and bloodiest battle of her entire life, where she defeated him and beheaded at the expense of her own body. She remembered the brave ninja dug up her torn, singed and crippled self out of a mountain of rubble and debris. She remembered the gorgeous woman feeling her grief of dying without keeping battling the fair fight, her will of surviving, her ferocious fighting spirit latent in her and her wish of getting a body where develop it. The physical fit of a true warrior, instead of the shell to store her psychic powers.

And she remembered the woman granting her wish and selflessly forfeiting her life so she carried on hers.

She shook off her head, staring determinedly ahead. "We must focus in the mission. Period."

Wolverine shrugged, preferring let slide the theme. Each one has its own issues or cruxes to bear. "All right, all right. It's only I'd rather doing this with Jean. She was very reliable."

"I DO know." Betsy grated. She toyed briefly with the idea of jamming her psychic dagger up where never shines the sun.

She was truly thanked of that psychic fellow for have her rescued from the pens. She had tasted her power, tested her courage and valued her altruism. She was certainly a woman to be reckoned, worthy of the esteem and respect her ex-partners of the rebellion gave her. But ever since her recruitment Betsy got the definite impression of they were comparing her with Jean, and looking her down. And it irked her.

"Look ahead" Logan muttered of sudden, his throaty voice interrupting her reverie. She stared at him first, and after at the direction his arm was aiming towards.

Black specks were disrupting the flat frontier between sky and sea, shining with the beams the sun cast on them. Steadily they began to grow and increase in number. Then they saw it.

Sprouting out of the ocean as tall and sharp spikes, a frontier of high towers stood upright in front of them, spreading from North to South, beyond of eyesight reach. Each building was a grotesque mass of fang-like spires spearing the sky and winding arcs and bridges connecting and linking the towers with each other. The long and extensive barrier of turrets stretched alongside of the entire American continent as a belt, beginning in the shoreline and going several miles into the sea. Watchtowers, bulwarks, checkpoints, arsenals, military bases; that gigantic, monstrous and terrific structure was all that and more. Much more. And it was stained and tainted with blood. Blood of countless slaves had been spilt to build it, but that never mattered to Apocalypse.

It was the Atlantic Wall. A stronghold capable of bearing, withstanding and enduring coordinate attacks of thousands of Sentinels. His offensive setting was capable of obliterate half planet with one single sweep of missiles.

And they were crashing towards it.

Dodging and sidestepping barrages of lasers, the Sentinel scurried off the reach of the cannons and rammed on the main compound of one tower, striking it with the shoulder. The massive spike of metal shuddered and shook as a tree assailed by a hurricane.

Weapon-X and Psylocke dismounted off the Sentinel with a somersault, rolling airborne and landing smoothly on the floor of flawless and slippery layers of titanium. Both pivoted on their feet to survey the nightmarish fortress while the Sentinel mumbled a final message with its toneless, cold voice.

"Have you listened the 'temporary reprieve' bit, Psylocke? The Council sure knows to use a short leash!" Logan shouted, willing be heard above the mayhem of warning cries and alarms buzzing.

"I'm more concerned with the implied meaning of 'Bring us here!" Betsy shouted back, her body starting to give off a violet energy enveloped her shape. "I think as long as we performed the mission we don't need return where the Council is concerned."

"Or the Sentinel doesn't need bring us back" Logan nodded sagely, and narrowed his eyes when his ears perceived a noise "Look out, girl, looks like we're about of getting company!"

The shimmering glow enveloping to Psylocke flowed towards her right fist. "I wish they hadn't bothered in welcoming us."

One hatch slid open, allowing the rushed exit of a squad of heavily powered, enraged Infinites. With bellowing war cries, the pair of X-Men bolted onwards, lunging over them.

Of sudden, when they stepped onto a tile, the unseen trapdoor caved in, and both mutants plummeted in the darkness.

A sudden rush of panic overwhelmed to Psylocke, but she overcame it swiftly. The ninja folded her knees, curling her body in a ball, and rolled on the air. Her body skimmed over something and in the dim light she could make out one wall nearby. Unfolding her body abruptly, her feet connected with the wall. She used that brief connection to support and propel downwards, landing upright on both of her feet.

Right when she breathed in relief, a steel-tough fist struck her face, and she crashed down on the floor.

Logan, being just so agile but most weighed by far, tried gyrating his body to cushion the impact of the fall. His body slammed brutally the floor, and he whimpered with the ringing hurt his skull. He struggled to stand upright when something -soft, wide, gelatinous- coiled around his stout frame and hauled him high on the air.

When his eyes got used to the scarce illumination, he saw better the contenders were assailing them in that bottomless pit. He spotted the beast-like visages and the golden pieces of armor plating.

They were two Balrogs, animalistic and wild warriors genetically engineered by Sinister. He had been picked by a strange monster of twelve feet of height with tentacles and a head vaguely resembled an elephant, whereas Betsy was being cornered for a four-armed hybrid of gorilla and bear.

He barked a swearing and lashed out violently with his claws, but the vice grip of the animal was strongest. The tendril squeezed his tentacle around his shape and started to slam around to Logan, beating him unceasingly against the walls. Weapon-X bit his lips to no cut his tongue, and wrestled to keep aware. His glazed eyesight spotted an indigo blur. He realized it was its face, at his claws' reach.

He slashed swiftly, praying to connect. An inhuman shrill of pain erupting out of fanged maws and the feeling of the loosening of the tendril announced his success. Logan hurried to sever the massive tentacle strangling him, and lunged on the animal. Six claws gleamed in the darkness, and blood and guts were sprayed everywhere between noises of flesh chopped, moans and whimpers.

Meanwhile Betsy was discovering seven-feet-tall bipedal monsters are amazingly fast to theirs size. And four arms punching and clawing with berserker rage were damned difficult of dodging. Her face was already purplish with bruises.

One palm blow of the Balrog sent her reeling on a wall. She spat a trickle of blood, and before of having got back her bearings, the animal grabbed roughly her forearms, and using the same momentum he crouched to grip her ankles. Then he let go her upper limbs and arched backwards its trunk, heaving her over its head. Using to Betsy as a whip he smashed her several times on the soil, before releasing its grip.

Its mistake. With her legs free, Betsy cartwheeled away with lightning speed, and sprang on her feet before the monster spun towards her with a wrinkling of its furry snout. A bellicose war cry erupted out of her throat when she rocketed forward. While she sprinted, wisps of energy swirled around her right fist, coalescing in a sort of immaterial drill instead on a blade.

The ninja slid easily amidst the gigantic arms, and she launched her fist onward, striking on the middle of the chest. The animal cried when he felt the energy weapon boring a hole on its thorax, and spearing its heart. Betsy pierced its loathsome body with unyielding determination and fury written all over her features. She didn't flinch even when her fist drilled the whole thorax, jutting out of its body among the shoulder plates, or when she pulled out her limb laden with blood and the Balrog fell sprawled on the floor.

She wiped out diffidently the droplets of blood had showered her. In the meantime, Logan approached to her.

"Sure I hope those weren't theirs best ones. Then this will turn out to be too easy."

Suddenly one hidden door clicked open, and a swarm of Infinites burst into the room. Both got their fighting stances ready, and bolted towards them.

Very soon a bloody pulp made of limp corpses lay around, with the armors shattered and the limbs broken. The luckiest were barely breathing.

Logan and Betsy stormed out of the room and in the passageway, sweeping the tides of soldiers arrived with assassin intentions. The two mutants exchanged a telepathic conversation, and they parted ways, Logan running upstairs and heading towards the Main Room, while she blocked the staircase threshold with herself and stopped to the Infinites as a breakwater the waves.

A long and razor sharp blade of blazing purple energy flashed in her hand. With a roar she attacked. Very soon the sound of curses and moans, flesh ripping, joints snapping and bones crunching filled the narrow corridor. And she felt a wild and exhilarating joy while beat wildly the men assaulting her, roughened murderers powerless to stop her. It was a kind of speeding drug, the sensation of her fists pummeling against the flesh, shattering armors, twisting limbs and crunching bones. That feeling and the sensation of absolute invincibility were a dangerous cocktail was drowning her in a blessed frenzy.

Right when she was more engrossed in the battle, the ceiling glowed with a blistering light. A plasma stream melt the roof with its unbearable heat, scorching the ground she stepped one split-second before.

Betsy rolled away with a handspring, gazed the hole upward, acknowledged the blonde and sinister figure, and gulped nervously.

Meanwhile in the Main Room, soldiers ran around, nervous and frantic with sheer fear, barking orders nobody bothered in obeying. A bad organized group joined to make a row in front of the doorway, pointing rifles and lasers towards the entrance.

Noise echoed from one wall. The screeching noise of metal ripping metal. Several slashes had shown on the wall, six gashes slicing diagonally the steel paneling in two rows, drawing a 'X'. Sharp claws pierced thick layers of metal, and the wall was ripped apart in shreds when Logan, Weapon-X, pierced through, somersaulting towards the Infinites with the urge of a missile. He attacked mercilessly, ignoring the bullets riddling his body and the lasers scorching and burning his skin. As he dove towards them his movements resembled one dance, where he cleaved, slashed, stabbed, speared, smashed and crushed.

One level lower, Betsy was occupied leaping away to dodge ripples of plasma capable of vaporizing her flesh in seconds, leaving remaining a blackened skeleton. Havok was flaring with energy, absorbing stellar plasma at great speed and unleashing waves of heat.

"Come on, bitch!" He snarled, shooting with both of his fisted hands "Tell me how you broke out of the pens and who helped you, and perhaps I'll let you alive!"

He joined his fists and blasted a ravenous and dazzling bolt. She ducked, and began a dance of handsprings, jumps and runs, moving aside of the beams and getting progressively nearer to Havok. In the meantime Betsy activated her telepathy to trick his perception of space and time.

Suddenly she sprang in front of him, reared her arm and hammered his forehead with her clenched knuckles, imbedding her psychic dagger deep into his brain. Havok squealed and gripped his head, drowned in the purple light raking his brain. The sight cheered to Psylocke the fewer seconds she lasted in realizing the feedback was occasioning a violent backlash. She reacted just in time, raising her hands before the world around exploded in a tidal wave of hot-melting, ivory-white radiance.

The Prelate kneeled down as the excruciating pain flaring in his nerves receded, and dazed his brain started to regain his bearings. His eyesight, blurry and glazed with tears, noticed of Psylocke. The ninja was crushed on a wall, with her back glued on it. She remained conscious and slightly crouched, keeping her palms up and open, as holding something. The place she was touching was dented with the printing of her silhouette, and the entire passage around was sizzling and steaming, having suffered the effects of the plasma discharge. The steel had melt and bubbled, giving to the corridor a surrealistic looking-alike.

He panted laboriously while he stood up. "Wench" He spat. "The silk gloves treatment is over since now. Eat this!"

A sphere of solid light flamed on his hand and he blasted it towards her. Unexpectedly it smashed on a screen of thin solid air, bursting in little sparks and fading away.

He stood speechless. "Where have you learned to do that?" He inquired, genuinely curious.

Betsy had been brought to her knees with the impact. Slowly she stood up, and willed her telekinetic shield around hers. The shield gleamed and shimmered with light. Betsy invoked her daggers on her fists, and raised up her guard. "Surprise, surprise, now I'm also a telekinetic. And believe it or not, the credit goes to McCoy. Unbeknownst to that degenerate beast, when he experimented with me, he unlocked other psionic ability in my brain. When I was with the X-Men, Magneto found out it and pushed me to develop it and test its limits. Do you want finding out exactly which they are, Havok?"

She lifted up an arm pretending an attack, but in reality masking with that motion the chunks of steel -shrapnel molten and sharp as jagged razors- her telekinesis had picked up, before hurling at Havok. But radiant brightness enveloped his body in amber glow, and the projectiles were dissolved in metallic lava.

"Your petty skills are useless, whore." He sniggered. "You have two options: Confess and die quickly, or shut up and die in a long and painful agony. Choose your pick. By the way, where is your partner?"

Albeit her head didn't move, her pupils looked up. "On your place I wouldn't be getting worried over that. Trust me. And by the way, I suppose that you get stored plenty headache pills."

"What hell are you talking about?" He wondered.

One second later, Weapon-X dropped from the roof, stomping with both of his feet on his head. As he landed neatly, Havok was thrust on the floor. There he lay motionless, knocked out.

"Great, Summers. I was wishing meet with you." He got ready his claws. "There's plenty stuff my six buddies want saying you. And sure I hope you're up to listen at them."

Betsy immediately was by his side, resting one hand on his shoulder. "I'm sorry, Logan. Believe me I hate stopping you in this, but we have no time to revenges and settlements of feuds. The Sentinel is battling in defensive mode and we are running out of time. Have you broken down the system?"

He nodded, sheathing his daggers in his knuckles. "It's now a fucking mess, lass. They won't be doing anything with it for a long while."

"Splendid. Then it's time to scamper and get the hell out of here."

Weapon-X growled, forced to agree with her. He wasn't fond of leaving behind to Summers alone and unchecked. He would rather hinder him or handicap him of some way -preferably chopping off his legs-, but there was no time to waste in satisfactorily personal pay back.

Both warriors dashed hastily towards the upper levels, fighting their way through the few troops of Infinites enough bold or fool or frightened of Apocalypse to try stopping them. At last they reached the way out, letting a path of destruction and carnage in the wake of their trail, a wasteland of shattered armors, bloody piles of corpses smearing the floor, and blood and entrails splattering the walls.

A rush of wind blew them violently when they emerged out of the gate. The Sentinel was standing by to less than one third of mile, struggling to stay whole until they arrived. He was dodging and blocking enemy fire and throwing counterattacks every so often. Both exchanged a glance, and sprinted towards it. Still Betsy lagged behind Logan, since while he didn't sport signs of fight other than tears and cuts on his clothes, she was limping with a wavering stride and struggling to keep up with him, hindered for her wounds and bruises and lumps on her skin.

They were near of the Sentinel when an alarm ringed suddenly on her head. Too hurried and startled to be subtle and controlled, she pivoted swiftly on her feet, blasting with her full telepathic power, gathered and focused in a single beam. The purple lightning bolt struck the last pack of Infinites head-on, short-circuiting and frying their minds within seconds. Pushed for a sudden drive, she flung her arms onward with her palms wide open. Flaring tendrils of psychic energy sprouted from them, swishing while slashed the air, whipped the writhing bodies of the soldiers, and tossed them in the sea with telekinetic lashes.

A rough and furry arm wrapped around her waist and she was dragged of sudden.

Logan held her awkwardly as he ran and leapt on the Sentinel, clambering laboriously along its body and up to the head, with the passenger hoisted in his arm all along. Once up there, he laid carefully to the ninja on the shoulder of the robot. "I ought to have thought about that earlier. I'm sorry, Betsy." He growled plaintively.

She blinked with surprise. She wasn't sure of whether he was sorry or angry with himself, but was shocking watching these features displaying a fathomable and sincere concern instead the mask of harshness and fury he cloaked usually to himself with. It was a welcoming change, especially considering he had acted very gruff and anti-social where she was concerned, and suddenly was showing he cared for her. Or at least took upon himself the duty of taking care of a partner.

The 'ground' abruptly quaked and inclined. They settled on the massive and square shoulder while the Sentinel, who had noticed its cargoes had returned with the mission successfully accomplished, rose up and hovered airborne. The hieratic robot straightened its body and stood upright and majestic as a mechanic Colossus of Rhode, with its blue and green frame twinkling with the gleaming daylight. Its tall mass loomed over the remnant Apocalypse soldiers, dangerous and threatening.

Abruptly one explosion erupted, and a stream of rippling energy pierced its right leg as a bullet tearing the flesh. The Sentinel lurched and stumbled backwards, menacing with toppling. Logan and Betsy feel it wobbling and swaying, and used their strengths in clutching tightly to theirs handles. Their heads ducked simultaneously avoid the barrage of dazzling plasma bolts were being frenziedly shot at their direction.

"Oh, no" She grunted.

"Oh, yes" Logan retorted. "When you make a mistake, it's big, Psylocke."

Standing on the murky doorway the Prelate Alex Summers was wobbling unsteadily while his clenched fists crackled with energy. His disheveled looking and tattered clothes didn't diminish his menacing aspect and his fear-striking countenance. He was boiling in raw energy, with sparks erupting from his skin and singing his spiked locks. Around he energy was gathering and accumulating with no control or measure. The very air was sizzling and churning with steam.

"Where do you think you are going at, genejokes?" He roared at the top of his lungs. His eyes danced wildly, erratic and glowing with pure hatred. The X-Men gulped with nervous apprehension. He was wholly maddened. "Repugnant traitor vermin! I'll reduce you to yours atoms!" Alex boomed with the fury of a thunder. With that his body exploded in charring energy, the explosion matching his yell.

Meanwhile the Sentinel had established and balanced, and now was staring at Alex with its unreadable face, bereft of emotion. The only visible changes were the beeping red lights flashing on its eyes.

/Mutant Menace Targeted. Mutant Identified As Alexander Summers, Prelate Havok, Alpha-Level/ It uttered /Proceeding To His Termination With Extreme Caution/

He aimed a huge fist towards him. A metallic click sounded on the elbow, and the forearm separated from the other half of the limb. The detached member rocketed towards Havok, who was too stunned to react, snatched him in the vice-like grip of its fingers, and with a burst of flaming motors the punch launched to itself inside the Tower, imbedding in a teleporter portal.

With a bloodcurdling screech, the Prelate vanished in a pool of light, blinking in other portal, far away from them.

Weapon-X and Psylocke gaped, victims of the most absolute disbelief.

/Mutant Menace Neutralized. Objective of Mission Achieved. Proceeding To Return To The Headquarters/

With those words the Sentinel started the motors attached to its heels and backside, and it floated on the air before skyrocketing upwards and sailing across the blue sky, back to Europe.

The cold hurricane slapping her face and prickling her hide with frostbite pried to Betsy out of her stunned state. She clung to the robot with her hooked hands, performing again the exercise of riding the Sentinel avoiding being dragged away for the fast wind and thrown out of the carcass and in the unforgiving water. She was growing very tired of that old stunt was leaving her body sore and cranky.

Logan held to himself dexterously beside to her, fixing his eyesight on the far sky. Countless specks were spotting the skyline, growing and flying towards them at great speed.

"Look, Betsy. Looks like today we are driving against the traffic."

She gasped in awe. "It's the Great Evacuation, Logan."

Both kept silent and still while the specks grew steadily, turning blue instead black, and glowing with metallic glints. Slowly they took shape until becoming the outlines of several Sentinels. A lot of Sentinels. A swarm of Sentinels, soaring with rocket speed towards them, a fleet so massive darkened the sky and clouded the sun, so large embraced the full skyline. The roars of their motors joined and blended together, creating a horrific and eardrum-shattering rumble, louder than millions of thunders. It reminded to Betsy of the Doomsday, even if the Sentinels resembled a buzzing swarm of metallic beetles.

The telepath and the feral mutant watched them as wheezed past them. Their flights slashed the air and left a trail of thick and acrid smoke behind. Jokes about bees or wasps aside, she couldn't help feel hope blossoming in her aching and bleeding heart, seeing the European helping to the helpless and tormented humans of America. Perhaps there was hope to be embraced after all, although she was guessing Logan preferred wait to see that people safe and sound in Bristol before of allowing to himself breathe in relief.

Her gawking stare remained transfixed and enthralled in the robots soaring in endless rows towards North America, when a sudden ripple suddenly ringed in her mind. Miles far away met a familiar mind. Her worry and distress were so overwhelming she was projecting strongly from so long distance. Betsy was nearly flooded with those overflowing feelings.

Ororo. She and others X-Men were jeopardizing their lives in Maine to help to the Sentinels to protect to the people and rescue them from the bloodstained and sharp-nailed Apocalypse's clutches. And she was worn off, having used her vast climatic power until her exhaustion.

Grim fear crawled in her chest, dimming the restored hope, and anguish gripped her heart. Elisabeth Braddock, never the most religious person on the wide world, mumbled one silent prayer for her friends, at the same time sending hope and encouragement to Storm.

She beseeched to a God had forsaken its world and its children to save her friends and permit the evacuation.

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A lonely, murky-black carriage rolled along a dusty path, concealed in the shadows of the night. A silvery full moon cast its ivory radiance over the Earth, enlightening the route with pale brightness. Sitting on the box rested two figures, one of them holding the reins of the two mares trotting at leisure along the country, and other determinedly focused on the film of sand and filth covering the barren ground. He narrowed two tired eyes, and suddenly held full reign of each grain of dirt and speck of sand covering the floor. He started to entertain to himself picking up the motes and swirling them in tiny vortexes and clouds.

Despite of the mix of amusement and training he was dozing slowly, lulled with the frequent bumps and springs of the coach, and drowsy with the glittering and mesmerizing nightlight. Sometimes his friends compared jokingly the starts of the coach with the sways of a crib. He used to smirk to that mocking way of calling him 'baby', but he really didn't remember how was a crib or a lullaby. Neither how was being cradled by loving arms and soothed with tender and melodic words. He knew nothing of that, so he couldn't feel reminiscences at all.

He might get weary, but his mind was too anxious and edgy to simply rest, and stashed plenty psychic energy, enough to afford a waste of power so ridiculous and useful as scanning from time to time the astral plane. Suddenly his brain brushed with its sweeps a presence very nearby. It seemed no hostile, but it felt oddly familiar. And it startled him in some strange kind of way he couldn't explain.

"Forge" He whispered. This didn't bode him well.

"I've seen him already" His mentor and father nodded from the depths of the cowl.

Standing in the middle of the way stood a tall figure, showing the same calm of someone who is waiting patiently. The moonlight showed a large man wrapped in maroon robes, too thick and warm to that region and season. His face was chiseled with very rough angles, and his round head was fully shaven except several long strands of raven hair he had tied in one plait.

Nathan felt to himself stupidly curious with the man and his strange appearance.

"Good night, noble travelers. Excuse my intruding, but I noticed of your cart and few people travels like that in this age." He greeted with a sweeping gesture. "I'm called Essex. And I think I can be helpful to you, friends."

His eyes sparkled with a crimson shimmer, and his mouth's corners tugged the lips upwards. The smile displayed sharp shark-like teeth, and it was very eerie and bereft of human warmth. It was a cold and predator grin, which tried to seem kind and reassuring. It was unsettling instead, like a lambskin dressing a wolf. Evil playing to be good.

Nathan felt a disturbing shuddering. He hesitated of that man, and wondered whether that grin, with those mischief eyes and that greedy countenance was led at him. The man seemed a hunter had just found his prey.

He steeled to himself, set on reading and scanning his mind to verify that person. Then he would know what ought to be done with that man. All in all, whoever that man was he couldn't keep anything away him, neither hide secrets to his telepathy. Right?

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End of Part Three.

Notes: * In the Japanese mythology, Emma-O was the Judge of the Dead. When one person passed on, his soul met with him, and he decided whether it deserved the Heaven or the Hell or would go to the reincarnation.

In the Part Four Cyclops and Havok talk with Apocalypse, Scott and Jean investigate the departure of Essex and Betsy runs away from Europe. Besides, we see a day in the pens.


	4. Blind Flight

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Age Of Apocalypse: Shifting Times

Author: Jenskott

Summary: In an alternate AOA, Weapon-X never rescued to Jean Grey from the pens. That single fact changed the world.

Notes: Please, give me more reviews. I crave for them. Come on! By the way, I'm thinking about beta-reading the first and second chapters and post them in other archives.

The man Meltdown runs into at the beginning is a pre-existent character. I couldn't take the easy way and design a random and anodyne victim, nooo, I had to look for a Marvel character. I looked for a mutant first, but after I was picking other super-heroes. Regrettably the Fantastic Four, many Avengers, Daredevil, Punisher and others had been used already. Finally I settled on War Machine (Jim Rhodes). But his apparition isn't very... important or crucial anyway.

Rating: PG-13.

Disclaimer: Sadly they belong to Marvel Comics.

Feedback: To jorgisimox@hotmail.com. Very cherished and appreciated and beloved. However English isn't my native language, therefore forgive my very obvious mistakes. Still I'll thank polite advice.

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Part Four. Blind Flight-

Midnight on the pens.

Tabitha Smith had lived through better days.

Those were the murky thoughts, oozing bleakness, of the girl while she lurked along her cell. Her black convict's dregs were tattered and torn, soiled with mud and stained with blood. Her legs were sore and limp and her muscles flaccid and numb, but she wouldn't let that deter her. The stubborn and determined teenager crawled along the ground, sinking her nails in the dust, supporting her weight in her elbows and thrusting her body forward. Her advance marked it a long path of dug furrows. She was get used to crawl like that continuously, and that tough exercise had changed her thin and smooth hands into callous and roughened claws, and had hardened her knees.

She dragged her body along the cell, ignoring the wails of the surrounding boxes, the reek of rotten corpses, the flies prowling in her wounds, the sharp ache in her cracked jaw, the injures in her legs and midsection and the pain in her gnarled hands. She ignored everything and advanced relentlessly. Nothing would stop her. Nothing would sway her away her goal. Nothing would be able deter her ever.

At last Tabitha reached her destine, and with a laborious effort she twisted her body and sat on her shins. Tabitha wheezed shakily, and rested. Her joints cracked with pangs of aching pain. One of her hands combed her cropped-short blonde hair, smearing it with plenty gunk. Her young eyes locked her tired and ageless stare with the glazed and frozen pupils of the man lying beside her.

He was a black man, and probably athletic and good-looking in another time. However he wasn't exactly in his best fit. His obsidian-like ebony pupils were frozen and ogled at the dome, and his eyes were permanently open, unblinking as glass beads. His gaping lips were dry and cracked and tinged with a bluish color. A trickle of cool saliva leaked out of one corner. He was sprawled in cross-position, as a sort of sacrifice, and his limbs were stiff and hard. Throughout his entire body he was bruised, and displayed on his skin riddles, welts, bruises, scars and lumps, every of them in rows or zigzagging along his body. His hide was clinging tightly the ribcage, and covering flaccidly a hollow abdomen. The last blows had disfigured his countenance with swollen and purple-hued marks of punches. Still she believed guessing sharp and eagle-like features. He had been handsome, serious and tenacious during his youth.

Tabitha gave him a forlorn, mournful glance. Wetness dampened her eyes. With great tenderness she moved one hand over his eyes and slid down the eyelids. Shut his eyes was the least she could do, and she'd close his mouth equally, but the jaw muscles were stiff already. She basked in her sorrow for a single moment more, allowing to the pity and kindness dwelling in her heart again. Vanished the mourning instant she opened her eyes and began to rummage in his pockets.

She swiped a slice of stale bread out of one of them. Overwhelmed with a joyous glee, she dusted off the coat of green mold and gnawed the bread eagerly. While Tabitha ate, she was assaulted for a strange fit of persistent consciousness. She quelled down the last surviving bits of her ancient scruples, and carried forward her misdeed.

He had been a good man. She wasn't sure of his genetic make-up, but he had been kind and generous, one of the last honest and noble souls in being hurled in that pit. He reserved food to the sickest prisoners, and he offered her bread or water every so often. She was glad of having known at least one good person in that godforsaken Hell, and would cherish his memory. But she needed live, and he wouldn't need the food anyway. Never again.

During the last outbreak he had received a nasty hit, suffering massive internal injuries eventually killed him with a long and painful agony. She hid behind him, waiting for a chance, and then pounced on the giant whore. Unfortunately her stupid brother had been there to back her, and he beat up her roughly, breaking her jaw with a well-placed jab. She looked forward to one opportunity to give him a lesson he would forget neither soon nor easily, but her hopes weren't high. They weren't anymore.

But one thing hadn't changed in that time: her will to survive. She had survived to the beatings of her drunken father. She had survived to the war, to the culls and to the moving to New York by a freight train -the detail told all really about what Holocaust thought of them and where they stood to him-. She had survived to the pens, the starving, the thirst, the beatings and the rebellions. And she'd survive to this, even if she needed steal breadcrumbs and spoiled meat to cadavers in order to see the next dawn.

She munched the last bits of the loaf, being careful of pick up any crust or crumb dropped on the floor, and licked her lips. The slice was just as tasty as the blotches of grime smeared her cheeks and chin, but she wasn't complaining. Her taste buds had been burnt long ago.

A young werewolf girl -Rhane was her name, she believed- crawled near of her, her nostrils sniffing the air fiercely. She had smelt the food. Oh, well, too late sister, the life sucks and all that.

Suddenly she spotted in her eye's corner other figure approaching. A dark, flowing shade. She turned at the newcomer, wondering if she'd be due to other fight. That type of stuff delighted to the jailers.

Her eyes bulged. It wasn't possible. She had heard rumors of prisoners of other cells when they were mixed (after each mutiny the Infinites hardly mattered them whether the prisoners were dumped in their own cells or not. Of course the prelates used that excuse to vent theirs frustrations with the low-rank soldiers). But she hadn't entirely believed it. However he was here. He had come. The mysterious figure rescued prisoners and led them to the freedom.

And it was here and now. That person was tall and shadowed, but she couldn't tell anything else. A wide and flowing dark-blue cloak draped its body, billowing with each motion and enveloping its shape in darkness and mystery. Within the cowl two red-glowing dots pierced the blackness.

He spread out one gloved hand. Towards Rhane. "Come with me if you want live."

The voice was a ghastly whisper and the statement was plain and imperious, but she had acknowledged a male voice in its rough and throaty tone. He was a man.

Propping on her elbows and knees, Rhane struggled to stand upright. She glanced with bulged and frightened eyes to her savior, and spared a brief at two bundles curled up in the corner.

The man nodded. "If you can carry them in arms, catch them."

Repressing a squeal of joy, the mutant of reddish-brown fur sauntered towards the two heaps, and returned hauling one in each arm. They were two young boys, one of pink skin and other of green hide, both with misshapen heads and blank eyes. They were shuddering and trembling compulsorily, clinging with despair to the chest of the girl.

Tabitha darted on her feet quickly, suddenly oblivious to the hurt racking her physique. Anxious eyes looked deep in the man's cowl, in the place where she guessed his eyes were. "Carry me with you, please" She pleaded. Tears stung her eyes. "I can walk on my own. I promise I'll be not a burden."

"I can't, child" The man sentenced, shattering her fluttering hopes, mirages of freedom had warmed briefly her heart. "If it was up to me, I'd get out to everyone of you. But the risk of being discovered is very high." He shut up for a second, mulling silent whispers as looked over her distraught, anguished face, scarred by the years and the grieves. "I'll be back for you. Soon." He muttered.

He ushered to Rhane out of the cell, and with a flap of his cloak, he strode with the same stealth secrecy and dramatic air he had sported when he sneaked into. Behind him the light bars flashed back, sealing the cell again.

However now Tabitha wasn't feeling despair gripping her soul. There was now another sensation stirring in her chest. Perhaps it was nothing but a fleeting hope, a letdown awaiting her at the end. But she now was looking forward to the future. If that man -whoever he was- tried saving her again, she'd be ready.

She claimed back her filthy patch of ground, and crossed her knees. Then she started to reflect. There was something amiss in that man. Something akin...

Of sudden she was sure of having heard his voice before, but it was muffled and masked, and she couldn't put her finger on the owner. And something in his stride puzzled her furthermore. Nearly seemed he was trying dodging something...

Of course. The watching cameras.

She recalled his movements, the route he had followed towards the doorway, and her eyes darted upwards. Her piercing stare searched patiently throughout the roof, looking for a camera.

At last. The device was over there. And it was aimed towards her.

Following on an odd impulse, she picked a pebble of the ground, and threw it towards the machine using her whole remainder strength. The rocky projectile struck head-on the lens, breaking down the camera.

From now on that garbage wouldn't be recording to anyone else.

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The next morning.

"I don't believe yet Sinister handed over information to the Human Council."

"Right."

"I'm glad of no having been the one explained it to Apocalypse."

"Right."

"Do you remember what he did to Gorgon when he talked about the Brazilian failure?"

"Right." 

"You aren't hearing one word of what I'm saying, are you?"

"Right."

Alex spun his heels at his brother and exploded "Damn it, Scott! Listen me when I speak at least!"

Scott withstood the Alex's outburst with an unnatural and studied calm born of the extensive practice. He sighed. "I'm sorry, Alex, but I'm having much to think lately."

"Fine" He growled in acquiescence but hardly placated. Scott blinked, suitably stunned. In the seldom occasions Scott was due to apologize to Alex, his brother beamed and gloated for hours. Alex had to be tenser and crankier than usual if he had accepted his apology without a fuss. Better be guarded-

"Snap out of it!" Alex roared again, and this time Scott felt a blush reddening his cheeks. What hell was wrong with him today? Normally he wasn't so distracted, and didn't slip so easily. "I was telling I find remarkable he used to that runt of Weapon-X to deliver his message."

"Oh, yes?" Scott answered, pretending disinterest.

"Yes. What does you redhead friend opine about this? She used to share bed with that troll after all. Albeit that was before she joined to us. Right?" Alex stressed each word, goading to his brother, baiting, yearning for he fell for it.

And how was usual, Scott didn't bite the bait. Instead he rebuked his taunts with his noncommittal, nonchalant voice. "She hasn't told me anything. And I fail in seeing what it has to do with this."

Alex curled his lower lip, considering baiting to Scott, but something in him pointed that it would be useless. He preferred change the theme. "Yet I don't understand why Sinister has rebelled against Apocalypse. It's suicidal."

His brother stared ahead and speeded up his pace. "Apocalypse didn't seem surprised of the news at all. Actually he behaved like if he expected Sinister betrayed him."

Havok shook his head in disbelief. "How can he possibly giving up such power?"

"HOW COULD HE NOT, ALEX SUMMERS?" A voice thundered. And its very echo filled the chambers and shook the walls.

They had just reached the Throne Chamber, so artificial and chilling, so sterile and bereft of life as every doing of its maker. And in front of them, flaunting dark regalia stood Apocalypse. Sit on the top of a mountain of fleshless and yellowish skulls, held by legions of cadavers and an immeasurable pride.

The Throne was situated on the highest peak of the Tower. Very few dared to tread in it, and even fewer returned alive of an audience. The domed chamber was a gigantic hallroom with pillars of machinery and cables going from floor to roof and holding the dome like columns of machinery. The room was submerged in deep darkness, but it didn't impede see the carpet of skeletons, bones and skulls littering the floor. The last remnants of hundreds of poor innocents whose only sin was being born weak. Theirs vestiges lay piled up in the vast room like a sinister and macabre furniture, and supported onto the tallest and most towering mound was the large armchair where Apocalypse lounged.

He supported lazily his arms on the armrests and leaned back his armored body in a relaxed position, which didn't instill comfort or irradiate enjoyment at all. His clutches gripped firmly the knobs, his fierce eyes flashed red, and the foreboding and grim countenance never left his expression while he inspected to both. It could become unsettling, and that was his obvious intention, since he couldn't care less the comfort and serenity of his slaves. Actually he preferred them ever frightened and cowed of his majesty.

Apocalypse eyed thoughtfully at each one with his petrified face twisted in a gloomy grimace. Inwardly he felt bemused by the blatant Havok's fear and uneasiness that glimmered on his blue eyes.

"How could he not, Prelate?" He bellowed again. "Of all my Horsemen, Sinister was the most reluctant to the saddle. And he cherished scheming and manipulating both in the life and in his genetic lab alike. Otherwise notice in the two Alpha mutant siblings he chose to his Elite Mutant Force."

His grotesquely thick lips curled in an awful grimace. A chilly mockery of grin. It gave shudders to Alex.

"But Sinister can't possibly be so fool to dare to defy you, my Lord." He stammered. A sudden rush for fleeing hurriedly out of there and away from him was taking over his body.

"No directly. Sinister is too clever to commit such mistake. There is no doubt that he shall have started some hopeless plan conceived to overthrow me." He frowned and picked up idly a little skull. His thick fingertips brushed thoughtfully the round and fragile head. "Let him follow on his game. Deep down into his soul he knows the unavoidable end shall be his demise."

Abruptly the fist closed violently, crushing in crunched fragments the skull like a nutshell. His arm whipped with fierceness in a circular motion, throwing around the shards of bone.

"I have been centuries filling oceans with my enemies' blood! I have built an empire over the bones of the ones opposed to me! I am APOCALYPSE! I REMAIN!" He bellowed with the rumble of a thunderstorm.

A rain of crunched splinters scattered over the pile of skeletons, bouncing on the skulls and slipping among the bones.

Havok stepped back without realizing, a deep dread and reluctance paralyzing him. Cyclops though remained impassive and motionless, observing to the megalomaniac unleashing his ire upon the remains of a deceased body. Sinister had trained him to remain imperturbable and cool at any situation, never showing any weakness. And wasn't in his character either back down in fear or cringe in choking dread. Threats or exhibitions of bloodlust, violence and power couldn't intimidate him, not matter whom.

Besides, he had never been impressed with those displays. Analyzed with cool logic, that feat could perform it any human. If Apocalypse stomped cadavers to show off his might, he had failed spectacularly with him. Scott had never understood why killing to someone weaker and defenseless is a proof of strength and manliness. Or the glory of making screaming to someone before annihilating him or her. He had kept those reflections always to himself, writing them off like heresy, but when he knew to Jean... He couldn't deny them longer. The pens stopped of making sense. 'Mercy will get you killed, Scott' had said Sinister, and it had been his motto to live for, but this monstrosity...

The miserable souls in the jails stared him with fear and horror. And why shouldn't they? He was the true monster there. No them. Him.

But he could be strong enough to overpower the fear to change his life, rebel and make amends.

"Excuse me, my Lord." He stated. "But I don't think we must underestimate to Sinister. He was one of the artificers of the Ascension. His knowledge can make us harm."

Hearing those words Apocalypse rose up slowly, with his blue-and-red cloak flowing sinisterly behind him. The External stood up in firm stance and looked over attentively at Scott. He was highly impressed. Even though he loved spreading panic and fright in the hearts of his slaves -because every of his servants weren't anything but slaves-, he didn't brook weakness or cowardliness. The strong and fit didn't shudder facing theirs superiors and betters, they showed respect and submission. Thus he regarded his babbling and writhing minions as expendable fodder cannon or mere forage, whereas he appreciated and promoted the ones proved bravery and determination. They were the pawns he could really craft in useful tools. And they paid respect and pledged devotion, although hardly showed any fear of him.

And Scott Summers was one of those men.

"Unlike your brother, you don't back down of my choler. You stand firm. It isn't a wonder Sinister talked so favorably about you, Scott Summers" Apocalypse muttered, peering at Cyclops with approving eyes. "Perhaps in the incoming conflict you shall fill your mentor's spot, remaining by my side like a Horseman."

"Your wish is my bidding, my Lord" The Scott's face was an unreadable mask of impassivity while he replied. From his eye's corner he had noticed something moving. His brother face. Downcast and twisting in a mixture of rage and frustration. Apparently he was neither glad nor pleased with the announcement.

He did two of them.

"Know many trials are awaiting you before reaching that upper rank, Prelate. For now you are in charge of the Elite and the pens. I shall be watching closely and carefully."

Alex coughed, managing reminding to Apocalypse of his presence. "You can count with my reiterated loyalty, my Lo-"

"Try pampering my ego in such pitiful way isn't the best method to earn my approval, Prelate" He sneered contemptuously, harshly. His voice dripped acid scorn towards him. "The audience is over. Dismissed."

The Summers brothers bowed respectfully and marched out of the throne with great strides. Both were enveloped in a tight, pregnant, strained silence. Alex remained tight-lipped and stiffened, restraining of speaking because he was churning in anger. Scott was grim and oblivious to the outside world, churning in another emotions. Alarm, apprehension and misgivings.

Apocalypse had said he would be watching him closely and carefully.

Fucking marvelous.

However wasn't until they had emerged out of the Black Tower and were ridding their motorbikes when Alex let out the outburst of repressed and frustrated rage he had refrained and bottled up until then.

"It was bad enough already you were the Sinister's favorite, and now Apocalypse himself offers you the Horseman rank. Everybody give you everything on a silver plate." He released his resentment through the method of clenching the throttle. He didn't hide his bitterness. Not even was trying.

"I never asked for anything of it, Alex. You DO know it." Scott retorted, turning around the throttle to keep up with his younger brother, ignoring his biting statements. He got used to put up with them as a rock boulder endures a tempest of leaves and pebbles.

"Then you're crazy" He sentenced, his fury increased twofold instead placated. Frustration was overwhelming him. His brother not only received everything but also he valued nothing. Further proof of he didn't deserve it at all from his viewpoint. "Don't you want the power, the prestige that Holocaust and Abyss have and gloat over? Aren't you tired of being anyone else's hound?"

"Don't matter what I want." He growled in comeback. And it was true. With the exception of Jean, it had never mattered to someone. It never did. He never asked for it, he never wanted it, he never needed it. They simply laid the burden on his shoulders, never interested at the very least in his opinion, and expected he fulfilled those obligations. Scott knew Alex had never considered that. He protested and claimed he was awfully underestimated and misunderstood, and reasoned it was obviously his blame. "My main duty is ensuring the pens. Oh, by the way"

He pulled down the brake, and the bike halted with the screeching sound of rubber on asphalt. A twin noise echoed by his side. His head turned at Alex. "When I return I want a detailed report of the last flight on my desk. Now I need look after of a problem."

A grating of jaws answered him. "Taking advantage of your charge already, Scotty?"

"Not even start now, Alex. I'm in a bad mood today already. You are the Chief of Security. It is your job."

Scott started the engine. The motor burnt petroleum with an insufferable whir. The noise was grating, but it sounded to purring murmur to its owner.

"Oh, yes? And what are you going to do now?" The plasma-generator taunted.

"Check again the Sinister's headquarters." Scott replied matter-of-factly. Alex blinked, wondering in a corner of his mind if Scott was suffering amnesia of sudden.

"Please, Scott! We have revised that everywhere! What can possibly you find worthwhile inside there?"

"Maybe every. Maybe nothing." He rebuked darkly, and motored out of that bend of the street.

While he swerved the first corner his eyesight spotted to Alex blasting to cinders a ledge. Scott wondered again what he had done to deserve such immense hatred and loathing of his brother.

Why did he abhor him so immensely? What had he done? He never wished the so-called honors Alex envied fiercely. He hated them. In fact he loathed all of this. The EMF, the pens, the Tower, the Apocalypse's America... All was wrong. That power wasn't such power. And he wagered Alex was spouting right now he didn't deserve be a Horseman. Laughable. He DIDN'T want being Horseman.

Really there was nothing for him in that hell. Nothing other than death at the end. And maybe it wasn't even relevant. His life was hollow, worthless and bereft of things the fate had taken away of him since his childhood. And he sometimes had cursed and blessed at once to that redhead and hotheaded rebel of green eyes and snappy temper for having showed him. She was someone worth of living for.

*********************************************************************************

Jean Grey pulled back her wavy curls of blazing hair and kneeled gingerly on the dust. A slim forefinger traced one straight line on the black grime soiling the boulders. Her emerald irises contemplated the white streak it had left. She rubbed her fingertips disdainfully to clean the gunk, and straightened.

A slight breeze blew among the ruins, and misshapen acid clouds rolled along the grey sky overhead. Her eyes surveyed the wreckage and she sighed. Loudly.

Scott, who had been checking the opposite side of the formerly secret hideout, whirled around slowly and placed a friendly and encouraging hand on her shoulder. There was something weary and fatalist in his gestures and his countenance.

"No luck, right?"

The shaking of head and her disappointed expression were more informative than her words. "No at all. Not even lingering traces of psychical residues. Technically this is a dead zone in astral plane terms. Sinister not only wiped off any bit of information but also cleansed telepathically the place. He did a thorough job masking his presence and destroying his trail."

Scott sighed, scratching his head. A light gust was toying with his long and fluttering brown strands. "It's obvious Sinister was preparing this rebellion since years ago and is likewise obvious he got ready for this moment. He knew we would track the entire country, and has taken measures to protect to himself. He knows our methods and has studied our technology in greater depth than any scientific. So then he is perfectly aware of the ways of hiding or dodging us. I reckon doubtful we found him, unless he commits a very blatant and clumsy mistake. And the odds of it ever happening are slim."

Unexpectedly his vision blurred briefly. He staggered backwards, feeling a sudden dizziness weighing in him. It reminded him of the headaches he suffered back in the orphanage, the first hints of the arising of his power. Scott clenched tightly his eyelids and took off his visor gingerly. His digits massaged in smooth circles his eyeballs.

Jean was instantly by his side, squeezing softly one of his shoulders. He practically could picture in his mind the vision of her face, distressed and stricken for the concern.

"Scott are you all right?" She queried. Her voice had an anxious quality on the tone. Next to distraught.

He placed back the visor. The telltale clicks signaled he had locked it and was held firmly around his head. One hand pressed gently on the bulged forehead, stroking and kneading it slowly to dull the discomfort.

"I'm just fine. I think" He whispered. His voice sounded worn and hoarse, and he slurred some letters, so it didn't ease the Jean's concern. "I haven't high temperature and my temples aren't clammy. It's the stress probably. A reunion with Apocalypse can be very tiresome and distressing. And frustrating."

"I know" She mused, remembering the first time she'd been introduced to that monster. It wasn't easy be several feet from him and pretending she didn't want to rip off his fucking head, spit it and piss on it. Especially when he began to speak. Her efforts and restrain were nothing less than Herculean then. "Attend to meetings with him almost seems your only task of late." She quipped, trying light up the situation.

"True, true." He stated with a nod. The last two days he had met with Apocalypse thrice at least, just like if he was filling his mentor's shoes already. The attendance to report Sinister had flown away the nest -with the very interesting assumption of Shadow King-, the emergency reunion to report of the breach in the Atlantic Wall, with the surprise of knowing who had passed information on the enemy in addition, and the last meeting that morning.

Isn't it ironical? He talked telepathically. We were going crazy to find a way of warning to the X-Men when Sinister saved us of the trouble at the end

"Yes" She mumbled off-handily. Her face couldn't mask her emotions though: a colorful blend of regret, longing and bitterness.

Scott pressed, maybe not very cleverly, but out of genuine interest. You have been very touchy with that theme since I told about it. Are you upset knowing your boyfriend is up now?

A mental sigh Partially, Scott. If you don't mind, I'd rather not speaking about it

Jean shut down her side of the link so he didn't feel the conflicting emotions swirling within her. She had felt a pang of jealousy when she saw him getting around with other female partner, the woman she rescued. She wasn't sure of whether she was jealousy for seeing him with other woman or for witnessing his easiness to replace his former partner for another, a beautiful telepath like herself. The former option was irrational considering she wasn't sure of her own feelings anymore, but the later one wasn't a bit more logic. Still she felt a grudging and petty resentment when she pondered about it. The part funny was that besides the bitterness she felt... relief? A loosening of the guilt?

So many emotions were entwining together and yanking of her from every the directions. She couldn't untangle her own mixed feelings, a jumble of emotions tightly threaded she couldn't straighten or didn't want sort out. Confusion, fear, reluctance. And if she couldn't explain her heart to herself, how could she begin to explain it to anyone else?

She opened again the psilink, allowing to Scott know the last part of her reflections, hoping he understood it. He nodded.

By the way He broadcast, switching themes with a fast easiness born of long practice Do you remember the telepath the Shadow King talked about? Have you perceived anything about it?

She kept the silence for a short while. Yes. I did. Miss that presence would be hard

Then do you know anything about him? He prodded. He didn't verbalize the importance of that finding. A telepath capable of daring the Apocalypse's supremacy would be very helpful to theirs plans.

Yes. He's moving over the Middle West. I haven't tried contacting him, but he shines with the radiance of a star core. The astral plane is overflowed with energy these days because he throws waves of power in it, and the plane shudders and shakes each time he uses his might

Scott didn't understand really that technical babble about telepathy, but he had got a faint inkling of what she meant. Is he really so powerful?

Yes. I had never believed possible a human body was able of storing such mass of energy. His potency, his power... it is unheard! I've never known something akin to it. However the oddest part is... Somehow I think he's related with me

Scott blinked behind his red lenses. Perhaps you should speak with him. If he's so powerful can become a menace so terrible like Apocalypse himself. Maybe we can help him

Jean nodded. She knew, with wisdom beyond her years, that the line between a god and a devil is very thin indeed. Suddenly a nearby psychic flare alerted her senses, and she switched to spoken language subconsciously. "Scott, someone is approaching from the sky!"

"What is it? A Sentinel?" He spun around swiftly and scanned the firmament with his sharpened gaze. His keen sight had noticed a discordant shape moving few seconds earlier.

A darkened and cross-like figure sailed in front of the pale sun, before diving downwards with swift flaps of his long and broad wings of snowy-white feathers.

Angel landed smoothly on the ground, stepping noiselessly with his high black boots amidst the gravel and debris of glass and metal. With an uninhibited sweep of wings, he folded his extra limbs on his back and stared ahead at the Prelate.

His mouth twisted with a sneering grimace. "Please, Summers, I know you use shades but don't tell me you can mistake me with an ugly mutant-killer robot."

The flying mutant took a second to spare a stealth glance at Jean Grey, who was approaching at them and standing beside to Cyclops like she did always. Suddenly he felt a strange sensation. Of rightness. A weird compulsion, a longing, an odd homesickness. Like if he should feel this familiar for some reason, and grieved because it wasn't. He couldn't tell why. He had never known too well to Cyclops. They had never become friends, not even awkward. The man wasn't a generous or steady customer, so drawn in his obligations, duties and responsibilities he denied to himself the right to behave as a human being and getting fun. However he was correct and polite, reasonable when you weren't in his way and didn't cross him and wasn't liable to give troubles or close down the establishment. On the other hand Jean Grey was a wonderfully beautiful woman, a splendid piece of womanhood, but she had shown in very clear and unmistakable terms she wasn't even considering the possibility of getting involved romantically with him.

Her loss.

Then why was he regretting of sudden not knowing better to those two persons?

Jean Grey observed curiously to Worthington. He had stood frozen suddenly, and his thoughts were a quizzical jigsaw. She smiled with an amused and intrigued expression. At first she hadn't liked Angel. Actually she despised him openly like either of the X-Men. They considered him no more than a lapdog, a profiteer had survived standing in the middle of both sides, thriving at the expense of billions of humans and mutants that died everyday without a trace. He lived in his high golden palace while people perished, groveling as a worm to please to Apocalypse. But she had learnt gradually the life facts never are so easy as 'white' or 'black' and the people rarely can be compartmentalized. Scott was a fine example of that. There was more in Worthington than the eye met. And she had ended up admitting Angel wasn't really bad, avaricious or self-centered, but he struggled to survive in extremely difficult conditions. And despite of the fervent and earnest X-Men's spurn, they utilized him regardless because he was useful and convenient. So then they weren't better than he was.

Scott clicked two fingers together, snapping to Angel out of his oblivious state, and he felt a sort of guilty amusement seeing him blinking. He wasn't really very interested in anything of that man, but there had to be a mighty reason driving to Angel to leave his shelter and meet with them in the secret Sinister's lair.

"What are you doing out here, Worthington? I believe this is the first time I've seen you out of your nightclub."

Angel shrugged his shoulders, and his wings mimicked the motion. "I was told Sinister flew off the nest." He hoped his nonchalant expression covered the blush creeping in his cheeks. He really shouldn't have got spaced out. It did him look like idiot.

A brown eyebrow was arched. "I'm sure you did know it before me."

"Ha! This time my contacts weren't so good."

Jean glared him dubiously. "Why are you so troubled, Worthington? You've kept always away of the political affairs of the Tower."

"And with good motives... but there're rumors about a war with Europe." Steadily his evasive glance was sharpening in a worried, tense frown. "And an Armageddon would be bad, Miss Grey."

"Bad for whom?" Scott interjected suddenly.

"For you and for me, Scotty. For you and for me."

Scott began to speak with Warren in a paused, secretive way, questioning more than conversing or answering. While he kept to Angel distracted, Jean stepped back and lifted up one hand to her temple, shutting her eyes.

His soul drifted away her body and floated towards other plane of the existence.

*********************************************************************************

Imagine a world fabricated with billions of patches of different color, size and shape, arranged together as a three-dimensional checkered mantle. Imagine billions of billions of immaterial strands entwining and weaving in a tapestry of ever changing images and pictures. Imagine a realm of pure energy, fueled with the raw power of the whole conscience of the humanity, billions of minds pouring in it energy, thoughts, reasons, emotions, dreams, desires, ambitions, letdowns, loves, hatreds, loyalties, betrayals. Imagine that blend stirring together, mixing and churning slowly. Imagine a landscape perpetually changing and folding on itself, irised with the entire range of colors in the chromatic spectrum, glowing and pulsating with sparkling brightness or dimming and blackening with pitch-black darkness. Imagine it ruled for waves and hurricanes of thought, altering unceasingly the panorama with each whim. Imagine a reign where there's no floor or roof, no up or down, where the only rule is the imagination and the only weapon is the will.

That is the astral plane, the world where telepaths dwell. The sum of the consciousness of the entire humankind. There aren't directions, there aren't distances, get the bearings is impossible with the single tool of the visual and spatial memory. The surroundings are changing, shifting and warping constantly.

Like always, the panorama of that secret and private landscape took the Jean's breath away. Of course it was entirely symbolic since in that shape she didn't breath.

Not stopping to gape at the scenery she tracked down the telepath she was looking for. She didn't take long in locating him, since in that ghastly shade she was pretty more sensible to the shifts in the astral plane. And that telepath blazed as a sun, dimming the remainder minds with his glow and heat. Even she was fazed and overwhelmed. It was so huge, so gigantic the astral plane couldn't contain it. It shuddered with its very existence. And each time he used his power, caused an earthquake whose ripples spread everywhere.

Jean traveled towards the epicenter with the speed thought, dodging sideways particularly nasty waves. As she plunged in the star and advanced further into it, she shielded his mind to avoid being charred by the unbearable hotness or snuffed out by the impossibly bright light. After of a flight Jean felt eternal, she arrived to the core.

She narrowed in slits her eyelids and peered into. Her eyes widened impossibly, shimmering with disbelief, matching with the faint gasp of shocked bafflement she uttered.

She was stunned. Such power, so much energy... and it was wielded by a teen, a boy couldn't older than eighteen. He was sat down onto the ground beside to one redhead girl... with vaguely familiar features. She perused to the young man while he talked about something -she was dying for listening, but she wasn't about of eavesdropping- and lowered his head. His expression was downcast and darkened in its upper half by long bangs of hair. Jean frowned, stricken for the next weirdness in that complex puzzle. He sported an uncanny likeness to Scott. His jaw, his nose, his cheekbones, his eyebrows... He was identical.

With a start the boy rose abruptly his chin up, and searched frantically everywhere with startled eyes. She understood quickly that he had detected some presence near. And she understood likewise that he hadn't spotted her. With all his unparalleled potential, he was very inexpert.

She chose to introduce to herself then. There was no point in getting him nervous and distrustful.

Boy?

Who is here? A pause. WHO IS HERE?

Calm down. I'm not an enemy or an attacker, but I'll not lower my defenses if you don't calm down

WHO ARE YOU?

It had been amazingly hostile. Understandable. The boy couldn't have led an easy, carefree life Do you promise calm down first?

I promise await your explanation BEFORE attacking

A sigh I suppose it's all I can hope for She dissolved her barriers of invisibility, standing in plain sight. She took care of donning an unthreatening form My name is Jean Grey

He boy gaped in awe. She smiled. He was liable to wait for a fearsome and horrendous assailant, no a beautiful redhead woman. Moreover she was purposely wearing a cloak of kindness and nearly motherly loveliness. A simple trick, but he was falling for it.

See? I'm not hostile. If I was you had sensed my intentions for now

I'm Nate Grey. Who are you?

Jean blinked. Grey? What curious coincidence. Albeit now she was giving him a second glance, had similarities between his psi-signature and hers own. Maybe the boy was a long-time lost half-brother... But she didn't imagine to her father cheating to her mother although she held fewer bits of her infancy.

Never mind. It was irrelevant right now.

He was looking at her suspiciously again Are you an Apocalypse agent?

He seemed ready to blast her in the oblivion if the answer was affirmative. No. I'm an undercover Resistance's member. I belong to the X-Men but I'm pretending siding with him to save lives

She folded the shields guarding her memory, leaving him taking peeks into. He submerged into her remembrances with excessive roughness and haste, giving her an unpleasant feeling. Nevertheless she let him wade through to corroborate her words. Then she threw him out and locked off her mind.

Are you convinced now?

Yes Nate answered, befuddled and worried about that woman capable of rejecting her probes. What do you want from me?

Help you in exchange of your help Jean stated. Apocalypse has noticed of you and has sent his vermin to recruit you or kill you. I'm sure of you are able of facing his troops but they won't be naive Infinites precisely. No, he'll send bloodthirsty hellhounds, duly geared and prepared to deal with you

She paused to allow the implications settled on his mind. I can see your power. It's amazing. However you are talent without experience. Perhaps you can defy to Nur but you lack of knowledge and training to defeat him. I'm more experienced; I can teach you. I can sense your hatred for Apocalypse. We can work together to destroy him once and for all

He curled his lips as if he mulled something. A reflection, a reverie, a pondering. He had taken seriously her proposal and was meditating about it. Jean felt cheered up and soaring in joy.

Suddenly a violent blizzard picked up her body and flung her far away, tossing her and beating her with impressive force. She struggled to overwhelm the stream, to cope with it without losing the conscience and returning with Nate. However the path to the Nate's mind was shut off and blocked with such strength the backlash hit her. Jean shrieked, eliciting a hurt cry coursed the astral plane and echoed throughout it. Pained, singed and tattered, she turned around and started the way back. She felt excruciating hurt in more ways than one, appallingly defeated and crushed in spirit and soul.

And in anywhere she believed listening to the chuckling, haughty and biting Sinister's laughter.

*********************************************************************************

Later on that day.

Cyclops banged open the door with one well placed kick and stormed into the rec. room. "Surprise inspection!" He roared.

The soldiers stopped momentarily of slackening and twisted to gape at shock the entrance of the High Prelate. Cyclops glared with disgusted annoy the slowness and awkwardness of theirs reactions. What silly waste of time. It was a surprise they were fit to belong to the army, and even bigger surprise they were able of holding correctly a weapon. And they had the gall of gloating of genetic superiority. They were the self-appointed strong ones, but if he had the authority they would have been labeled them like genetic dead ends and mailed to the mines long ago. He wondered often because the X-Men didn't provoke a highest toll.

"Is that way of greeting to your superior?" He grated with deceitfully soft voice. "Stand at attention now!"

His throaty bellow stirred to all in motion. The soldiers were started and startled with his imperious, enraged voice, and scrambled for get in a row hastily.

He paced in circles as a roaming beast, eyeing them thoughtfully. Scott stopped in front of the first and looked over him with an unreadable, inquisitive expression. He knew better than nobody how unsettling could turn out his aloof countenance, so silent and emotionless and with the visor masking his eyes. Neither of them could tell what he was thinking or what he intended. And he used unashamedly that advantage so many times as he might, like any good general.

"Your armor is a mess" He pointed with disdain, poking an accusing finger on an oily stain and tracing a line of green-on-black with the fingertip. "Clean it. I want being able of eating on it."

He whirled to the next without waiting for the reply. "You! Give me your rifle!" With a brusque gesture he snatched it and checked the weapon. "The barrel doesn't turn smoothly, the pipe is stuck, it isn't loaded and above all the ammo is outdated! Do you take care of your own weapon ever?"

He shoved the rifle back on his hands and headed for the third. "You! Your uniform is wrinkled! And you!" He turned to the fourth, sniffing disgustedly. "How long has been since the last time your walked in a shower? This is the example we are supposed to offer of the Apocalypse army? A group of uneducated pigs incapable of staying away of the sewers?"

He spun brusquely and blasted to one soldier, crushing him against the wall with the devastating power of his force beams. Afterwards he stomped towards the almost knocked-out trooper and hoisted him to his eye level with easiness. His hammering fist struck his face and crunched his jaw.

He whirled towards the rest with simmering fury shining red on his visor. "Demeaning words are my punishment to the untidiness and negligence! Raw violence is my punishment to the disrespect! Anybody else wants spouting another statement under the mistaken assumption of I shan't hear?"

The entire group backed down in sheer fear, all understanding he was edgy and shouldn't be pushed. Scott relaxed. "Fine" He huffed, masking his inward and broad grin.

Very soon he was checking to each soldier and finding motives to punish him or her or give an unpleasant task to keep him or her occupied. He knew he could easily make up hundreds of good excuses to keep to the Infinites out of the way when he broke out a prisoner in the midnight. Luckily Alex was out; on the contrary this wouldn't turn out so easy should he deal with him.

No doubt his little brother was now torturing yet another prisoner.

Fine. He'd take care of that trouble later. McCoy was his next reluctant stop.

*********************************************************************************

McCoy faced to his new experiment with a lopsided glance. His long clawed finger skimmed briefly the surface of a button, enjoying with the fear he acknowledge in his prey's eyes, a fear she wrestled to hide.

He clicked the button. Bursts of crackling electricity were heard along with a cry of excruciating pain.

McCoy turned off the energy, and stared at his toy. He was very pleased and delighted of having elicited more sweet shrieks out of her.

Tabitha Smith was shackled, tied and bounded to a grotesque framework, with her back bent along a weird table resembled a medieval torture horse. Thick silvery cables coiled around her limbs and trunk and metal bands held hers body on its place. Her hands, feet and head were encased in strange devices, which were electronic handcuffs latched on to the main machine with wires. Her clothes were torn and smoking.

Beast rotated gleefully a lever. With a low whir the helmet attached to her head clicked open, leaving exposed her bruised and bloody face.

He grinned.

"Are you ready and eager to collaborate, dear Miss Smith? Or are you determined to make this worst to yourself yet?"

Tabitha shook her head to get ridden of the numbing dizziness, and spat a droplet of blood. A salty-flavored moistness covered and smeared her lips. Likely she had bitten them during her convulsions.

She hurled to her captor a smoldering glare of unquenchable, burning hatred. She'd be cursed if she let them break her. And she'd be twice-cursed if she displayed fear, apprehension, cowardliness or reluctance. She refused give him that appealing satisfaction.

Pride matters aside she knew her only way-out in that situation was endure the torture. She couldn't tell them anything because her meager chances of fleeing would vanish as smoke then. If she shut up her mouth they wouldn't be able set a trap to him, and if she survived perhaps he would rescue her.

"F-fuck you, blue monkey." She grated, wishing her voice showed greater strength and courage.

He arched his brows. If someone judged only for the outward signs of sorrow and regret, that person would think he was sad after all. But Tabitha knew better that that, and she was absolutely aware of he was appealed of going on.

"I never found the necessity or the interest in engaging to myself in such onanist practices, miss Smith. I'm a genius working. My destine is recreating the nature, and I've no time or curiosity for inanities"

"And my hurtful screams are way more erotic, right?" She nearly shouted, an unmistakable sign of the partial return of her forces and her smart-ass, loud-mouthed wit. "You are sick, McCoy. You suck!"

He wiggled a finger with a mocking smirk tugging upwards his lips. "Such foul language to one child. Your slurs and offenses have upon me the effect of a sword upon the water. Less, in fact. And since you are unusually resistant to the procedure and my devices can't for unknown reasons break into your mindshields, I'm pushed to use the old-fashioned method. Brain surgery."

His long-nailed claw grabbed determinedly an odd laser gun with a saw or scalpel instead pipe. The edge's reflect flashed on the Tabitha's eyes, and the helpless girl writhed unwillingly. A light shone in his golden eyes then, and she knew the bastard had found the horror gleaming on her bulged eyeballs.

His forefinger brushed dissmissively the trigger while he approached toward her with slow, steady steps. Suddenly he halted his progress. He had felt someone looming behind him.

A threatening, towering shadow. Fearsome and furious.

A hand dropped on his shoulder. The grip was of steel, and the gauntlet weighed heavily on him.

"Stop this, McCoy. Now."

The voice was painfully familiar, and the tone didn't brook argument. However, Beast craned his neck to spare him a defying stare.

Regarding his roaring face, twisted with wrath, it wasn't a good idea.

"It's enough, McCoy. You are violating a direct order. No genetic experiments while is negotiated the Kelly Pact." Scott seethed. His jaws ground with every syllable.

Beast disentangled to himself out of Cyclops' grip and raised his chin up. "Your brother solicited I performed a thorough cross-examination in the witness of the past flight."

"This isn't interrogatory. It's torture. Plain and simply torture." Scott spat, ignoring the haughty McCoy's tongue. "We are on the brink of a world war NOBODY can win. And this type of behavior jeopardizes our last possibility of peace!"

Beast sneered contemptuously. All over his face were plainly written annoy and impatience. "You are such naive, Summers. Apocalypse wants nothing with the Human Council. He is merely placating them while awaits his chance to annihilate them once and for all."

While Beast spelt those words he felt a sudden fury sparking in him, inflaming him. He sensed the weight of the last months of delays, frustrations, hindrances, intrusions and accusations. He sensed its bulk, the heavy burden sat on his chest, suffocating him, oppressing him. He began to pace around, gesturing exaggeratedly and protesting loudly, oblivious to the scornful and less than pleased Cyclops' leer.

"I refuse cease my work due to a vain pretense of reconciliation with the Human Council! Speaking exponentially, my chore is far more important than this diplomatic charade!" He threw up his arms. "With Sinister away, I shall be the one will father the next generation of mutants!"

Scott nodded, giving him a sidelong glance. "You're right in one thing at least. Sinister isn't here..."

He raised his gloved fist, and his forefinger pressed a button of his golden gauntlet. "... And I'm in charge!"

Glass lenses slid away his eyes, stopping of containing the unstoppable energy flowing from his eyeballs. Free of the barrier obstructing the path, twin scarlet beams erupted out his pupils, seared the air few inches above Beast's head, and pummeled in the machinery. The lasers drilled the metal like hot butter, and pieces of metallic garbage and shredded shrapnel rained among the crackles of sparks.

Beast barely had ducked of the blast, and stared horrified and agape at the massive destruction. He stayed shrunk on the floor, well aware of having overstepped his boundaries with the ruthless Prelate Summers.

Scott faced him with clenched fists and a booming voice. "I'm in charge of the pens! Defy me again, and I'll close your mouth forever! Is that clear?"

The red glass of the visor glowed with burning red, and Cyclops fixed to Beast with a glare nearly so deadly as his own beams. That incensed, smoldering glare menaced with to shoot his force blasts and to blow up his head if he questioned him minimally ever again. Most likely he was looking forward to it or begging for one excuse. The blue-furred mutant cringed, cowed and bottomless scared.

"Y-yes, sir. Understood."

No likely, Scott thought. But he was warier, quieter and more responsive for the current moment. And It would have to do this time. He would need return later on, but that intimidation was enough by now.

He spun around and strode towards the door without sparing him the briefest glance. "Great. Now bring back that girl to the pens. And take care of nothing bad happens her during the transfer, or I shall be back."

To reinforce his point, he turned sideways and shot a last dirty glare.

Unbeknownst to him, the girl was still staring him, and nailing her absorbed bluish eyes in him. And particularly in the hooded red glow of his face.

She didn't know if was fear, hope or realization what was nestling within her chest then.

*********************************************************************************

Steam and mist enveloped his frame.

Hot rain drenched and licked his sore muscles.

Warm droplets slid along his skin, washing over the filthy grime.

He loved showering, the feeling of the tepid water hammering smoothly his hide and stroking him with motherly embrace. Raindrops splashed his eyelids, free for once of the cursed, fucking, hateful shades.

He was virtually blind when he showered. He couldn't obviously wet his glasses with water or cloud them with vapor, so he was stripped and bare of them. It was fine for him. He hated them with frenzied passion.

However he didn't bear close his eyes. Nightmares chased him whenever he did.

He was alone amidst the darkness, standing on the top of a mountain of cadavers. Suddenly the mount shook and stirred, and the dead ones arose. A legion of corpses advanced towards him with accusing stares in theirs hollow eyesockets, and wailing bloodcurdling moans with theirs toothless and bloodied mouths. And leading them was Jean, her body naked and putrefied and with bullets riddling it. With a howl of 'Murder!' she picked a spear and imbedded him in his heart. He screamed but it wasn't of use.

He was in the bottom of a well, floating in black, murky waters, with no hope of escaping. Glorious daylight shimmered unreachable on the outside. Suddenly Jean peeped her head in the pit, gasped and stretched her hand to get him. Desperate, he reciprocated and tried reaching for her arm. Right when he was brushing her fingertips, touching his salvation, the waters in the pitfall boiled and began to swirl in a whirlpool. Suddenly a  scrawny arm with clawed fingers and rotten flesh emerged out of the swampy mud and clung to his wrist. Dozens of pale and stinking zombies sprang out of the sludge and clung to his body, dragging him to the bottom to drown him. And in theirs faces he saw everyone he had slaughtered.

He wished opening his eyes, confirming they were just bad dreams and resting with that reassurance. But he couldn't, as well as he couldn't weep either. His blasts destroyed the tears. They denied him the least glimpse of humanity.

Outside of the shower Jean was tying the straps of the boots, trying very hard no look at the shadowed silhouette her sparkling pupils made out through the translucent glass. She labored furiously with her footwear, willing to herself to think about the task of that night, but her eyes insisted in averting towards the door. She scolded to herself, but she couldn't help ogle to his figure. Scott was really slim. He sported an athletic built, tall and slender. There was nothing fat in him, taut and soft skin covering tightly muscles exquisitely shaped...

She punched repeatedly in her temples to banish the naughty thoughts and focused on her outfit. She had showered before than him and was now putting the final touches to her uniform while he doused his body.

He was taking a long time, longer than usual. Nevertheless she knew what he was doing in that cubicle. What he was thinking about. What he was reflecting in. He did always the same thing. Lock in the bathroom and stare his image reflected on a mirror. Watch his skin through a red filter and see the blood staining his body in that color. Wash and scrub his hide until it truly turned red. Try desperately washing the evil taint, erasing the foul stench, cleansing his soul.

She could tell him it would never work.

The stain would never go away. The wound was so deeply carved with red-hot steel, so etched within him, he ignored how live without it. It had become part of him. Drench his hide and after scrubbing it fiercely with a towel wouldn't purify the inner wrongness he felt. He needed something else.

The drumming of the raindrops on the tiles ceased gradually. The swish of the door sliding open replaced it. Scott Summers stepped out of the bathroom, his body barely draped with a wide towel, and seeming as grim and forlorn as always. She peeked at him one split-second and turned, hiding the heat reddened her cheeks. That cloth was clinging loosely to his body, concealing the most interesting parts.

Scott picked up his clothes, determinedly looking away of Jean. She used to get nervous when he emerged out of the shower like that, but he pretended no realizing. What if she could possibly feel physical attraction? It didn't mean she was willing giving him something he couldn't, neither would ask for. She couldn't love him. She regarded him like a man worth of redemption but she couldn't possibly love to a bloodied butcher, he thought plaintively.

Right?

Be that as it may he never questioned and she never volunteered anything. He wondered sometimes if they would become sincere and real with each other some day ever. Still they could keep on with the pretense while the unspoken silence pact went on.

Their lives were filled with pretenses and masks. And mortifying as it was, thus the balance was kept.

He dressed his tight suit, zipping up the fasteners. The kevlar fit neatly to his skin, and the light gleamed on the ripples. He snatched armor pieces and clicked them along his body. He tied firmly the straps of the boots and slid his gloves on his hands easily. They cracked when he flexed them experimentally. He raised his cloak and tied it around his shoulders. His hands drew up the cowl, darkening his features in darkness.

He stared at Jean. She was fastening the drawstring of her hood. She tightened the knot, and parted fiery red bangs away her temples, before pulling up the cowl. He noticed idly that some locks insisted on keeping glued on her forehead. She had showered before than him but seemingly her hair wasn't fully dry.

"Are you ready already?" He hushed with his hoarse voice.

"Yes." She muttered back. "Let's go."

He nodded, cracking his knuckles ominously. Both headed at the doorway with resolution, a resolution turned into extreme caution when they shut silently the room and strode gingerly out of that shelter. Thick darkness and choking silence pervaded the room after of their departure.

*********************************************************************************

Meanwhile...

"Have you understood your orders then?"

"Yes, sir" Northstar replied with the same quickness he used in all his actions. "Tonight we shall patrol the East sector, near of the riverbank."

"Perfect. Dismissed."

"Permission to speak freely, sir?" Aurora raised a hesitant, wavering hand.

"Granted. What is the matter now?"

"Does one particular motive exist to switch the shifts? It isn't I have any trouble with the orders" She rushed promptly in adding "but I'd like knowing what we are looking forward to."

A disturbing smirk beamed in Alex lips, showing his two rows of needle-sharp, shark-like teeth. "You'll see."

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Across the ocean the wind streamed with relentless howls along the England shoreline.

It pushed violently the roaring waves against the bottom of the steep cliffs where they battered mercilessly the rocky walls and the spikes of craggy stony, bursting in explosions of water droplets and gleaming seafoam. Up of the sheer cliffwalls overlooking the ocean, the gale swept in ripples the grass of the sloped plains and the gravel of the ledges.

The unexpected roar of an engine starting disrupted the tranquillity of the lone precipice with its loud buzz.

Betsy Braddock sighed in relief when she heard the rumble of the motor and saw the propeller beginning its unceasing rotation. She was about of throwing the towel after the first failed tries. That scrap of garbage maybe had been used in 1940 during the Battle of Britain, and wasn't in good condition to fly, but she had to try. Thus she held the throttle firmly and led the aircraft towards the wild sea.

A rough voice yelled her codename behind her. Betsy tilted her head to look back, and peered at the black and short figure riding a motorbike.

Great. He had followed her. She bumped the throttle and the plane began its downward path.

"Psylocke!" His voice echoed beyond of the uproar of the wind. "I can't let you fly to America to warn them what is in way!" He left behind the bike and sprinted towards her downhill, leaping agilely amidst the boulders of the terrain.

"Cool. I can't let you go through with this" She stated, and the flight dashed towards the abrupt and looming ravine. Fly and live or crash down and die. All would be decided in one second's span.

"Damn it, Betsy! This is the war! It's a matter of killing or getting killed!" He screamed.

"You are crazy, Logan" She spat acidly. "Do you think seriously those nukes will kill only to Apocalypse and his Infinites? What makes you think the hundreds of millions of innocents left in America will remain untouched? You intend killing to the enemy and the victim alike. Millions of lives sacrificed, every our partners and comrades in America, the living wraiths in the pens... they will must die so you and the Council can tell the last word in this war!"

A bellow of indignation erupted out of her throat while the aircraft's wheels left down the firm ground and the plane performed a descending loop, rushing towards the raging waters.

"This is the beginning of a descent to the Hell, Weapon-X! And I refuse to allow it! I'm going to America to warn to Magneto and even to your dear-but-expendable Jean! And if you want stopping me, kill me!"

A stream of chilled frostbite coursed along the Logan's blood vessels when he heard her poisoned, terminating words. However he would never know what he would have done afterwards, since a sparkling purple flare engulfed and enveloped his frame. She had snatched him telekinetically.

Betsy clutched the throttle with a vice-like grip and pulled it in her to raise the nose. The old junk chimed and quivered, but it skimmed over the swirling waters, dodging the battering waves, and it flew upward drawing a perfect curl. Betsy let out an exultant shout of victory.

When the flight was upside down, she expelled out to Logan, relinquishing her telekinetic clutch. He dropped heavily on the unforgiving cliff's ground with a thud.

Slowly, arduously, Logan straightened to himself. Externally his scars seemed awful, with the hair singed and the flesh partially charred and cooked. However his inner wounds were far worst. He gazed piercingly at the colorful, tiny plane soaring towards the dusk. An infinitesimal speck in the bright orange of the dying sun. His hypersensitive ears could hear still the shouts of victory and freedom of the British ninja.

And he was unsure in his soul whether he was sorrowful or glad of her escapement.

With lethargic slowness the glowing disk sank in the deep ocean, a blaze of impossibly glowing red and orange. Upward a blanket of indigo shrouded the sky. As the last vestiges of golden sunlight faded, a starry path of billions of silvery dots spotted the black canvas of the sky, twinkling with titillating shine.

Logan remained sat long time on the top of the hill facing the ebony waters. Slowly, mutely, he rose up and started to walk towards his discarded motorbike.

*********************************************************************************

End of Part Four

In the next chapter, Scott and Jean are exposed. Will Havok be able of murdering to Scott? Besides, we see again to the X-Men, and Nate Grey makes his arrival in the pens.


	5. Collapse and Hope

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Age Of Apocalypse: Shifting Times  
  
Author: Jenskott  
  
Summary: In an alternate AOA, Weapon-X never rescued to Jean Grey from the pens. That single fact changed the world.  
  
Notes: I regret the delay but real life and other fics got on the way. The next chapter will come sooner, I promise. Please, keep reading! And review!  
  
Rating: PG-13.  
  
Disclaimer: Sadly they belong to Marvel Comics.  
  
Feedback: To jorgisimox@hotmail.com. Very cherished and appreciated and beloved. However English isn't my native language, therefore forgive my very obvious mistakes. Still I'll thank polite advice.  
  
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Part 5. Collapse and Hope-  
  
The creature didn't know what thing it was anymore. Its fragmentary memory recalled dimly a time of large forests with life stirring up in them. Massive trees and weird animals filled its world, and the animal spent its life in sleeping and patrolling its kingdom, looking for a daily meal or a mate for breeding. Its existence was nice and carefree, and the creature was glad and happy.  
  
Then came the time of the pain. It recalled wandering across its wood when loud booms scarred the ground and big fires charred the trees. Humans trapped it. Bullets wounded its gigantic body, electricity singed its fur and clubs bruised its skin. Hurt and laughs and cruelty and more hurt. And the hovering, grinning face of another animal, except its fur was greyish-blue and that monster walked upright. It ignored what happened, but amidst the haze clouding its tiny memory it grasped one thought with stark clarity.  
  
It had been harmed without mercy and with brutality, without motive and with cruelty. It had been beaten and scarred and flayed by humans. The same ones were now leading it callously to another jail.  
  
And it was powerful. Way mightiest than it had dreamed of or cared for. It could make them pay. Yes, let them reap their sowing.  
  
One of the Infinites was leading up to the animal into a bigger cage, and he frowned when a fearful howl, filled of hatred and ache and unquenchable rage, echoed behind of him. With a start he pivoted to face the monster, just in time of seeing a massive claw turning a blur of movement and slap his helmeted head.  
  
The brutal momentum of the blow ripped off instantly his head and hurled it against a wall, where it splattered in a pulp of blood and marrow with shards of metal scattering over the floor.  
  
The Infinites placed behind of him screamed, frightened out of theirs wits, and cocked theirs rifles, but the monster swept them with a swing of its muscular upper limb. Next it surged on the remainder guards and with a slash of its arms sliced asunder theirs bodies. The hatch was automatically shutting, but it rammed and slammed on the thick titanium layers until rendering them to shreds. It stormed out, free at last.  
  
The watchers recoiled in fear. That hybrid of tiger and bear was a monster of seven-feet of height and one thousand three hundred pounds of weight. Its trunk-like frame was stout but sinuous and nimble, giving it great strength and incredible agility. Its limbs were long to run at high speed and thick to stand on his hinder legs, and they trembled with barely restrained rage and savagery. Its paws were very broad and powerful, with glistening claws, sharp like daggers and capable of shredding metal as sandpaper. Its long and bristly fur was dark brown with black stripes, and was still burnt and singed in many places. Its maws were opened, oozing bubbling foam and displaying its long and pointed teeth, including two saber-like fangs. And its eyes were bloodshed pools of hatred, gleaming with a choleric red glow.  
  
The shell-shocked soldiers stumbled backwards. The bear-tiger smelt the scent of the flesh and the stink of the fear and lunged onwards. Rounds of bolts scorched its pelt and pierced its hide, but he was oblivious to them. Its immense fists shattered armors as eggshells, crushed bones as ripe fruit and shredded flesh as fabric. Arms swung to both sides smashing the Infinites on the heavily armored walls, and hurled around weighed men as torn rag dolls. Bullets, electric discharges and energy blasts hardly bothered it. They only succeeded in increasing cent-fold its fury and bloodlust.  
  
Meanwhile, the animals trapped in theirs cages were staring with frozen horror that gory scene. They were downright frightened of the monster, knowing they could be its next preys. So they were hunched in the bottom of their murky and stinking prisons, hoping it didn't hear theirs low whimpers.  
  
Havok pulled his motorbike in the kennel and watched with deep contempt and sickness the paltry soldiers' performance. He listened during seconds the cacophony of dying screams, growls, pleading cries and howls of raving and primal fury, and hopped off its vehicle.  
  
Alex approached with large strides at the gruesome scene, staring all along to the experiment disembowel casually several soldiers and scattering their maimed limbs everywhere. He crossed severely his arms and glared the fight with a disdainful grimace.  
  
"By the Dark Lord, I'm supposed to be Chief of Security, no of Animal Control." He snorted.  
  
Of sudden the bear-tiger noticed of a new figure entering in its peripheral vision field. Its smell was foul but its nostrils didn't detect fear in it. It was a challenge. Adrenaline was pumped in its bloodstream, increasing its murdering instincts. The tiger rotated slowly its huge shape, leering at the man with malevolent eyes and curling its red-smeared lips with a snarl. It lunged on him.  
  
Alex contemplated nonchalantly the bear charging with tiger-like speed, and he noted imperturbably the blotches of plasma smearing its maroon coat, the murderer glint of its fangs and the mixture of fresh blood and foamy saliva dripped out of its maws. He peered at the corpses piled and shook its head with a diffident air. It masked the inward satisfaction he was about of feeling, unchaining his power.  
  
"Incompetents. If you want something well done..." He voiced dejectedly and flung his arms onwards, both fists linked. An itch coursed them, and shimmering ripples of golden plasma erupted out of them, hammering to the mutated beast with rather ground-crushing force to slam it on the opposite wall.  
  
Havok stopped with one thought the stream of power flowing out of him and spared a glaringly stare at the nearest surviving Infinite. "How could possibly you be so incompetent? Am I supposed to do everything?" He spat.  
  
"I'm sorry" The kennel jailer whined pitifully, huddling up on the floor.  
  
"Sorry? SORRY? You-" The Havok's roar trailed off when sudden noises drew his attention. Sudden noises of an engine burning and wheels grinding on tough ground.  
  
He turned to see to Jean Grey parking her own bike beside one column and getting down.  
  
"Another ruckus, Prelate Summers?" She queried casually, tossing over her shoulders her rich red mane. "And provoked by another McCoy's hybrid, I see. Someone has to tell to the good doctor ties his pets."  
  
He observed her, sauntering casually towards him with a nonchalant and whimsical stance, and curled his lips in barely repressed disgust. "Speaking about responsibility, Grey? Then I suppose you know where my brother was the last night and what he was doing."  
  
"As a matter of fact he got bored to himself with paperwork until he couldn't keep open his eyes and then he retired to his quarters. And just in case of you want knowing, I was busy sorting out files. Why?" If Jean was shaken inwardly, she showed no outward signs at all. Nor a wavering in her stride, nor a blink, nor a faltering in her voice. His face was an unyielding mask. But Alex was aware of the truth.  
  
"We were awaiting him two hours ago, but both of you were nowhere to be found, like always. One patrol has found to Northstar and Aurora in critical state in the Alphabet ward. But you knew it already, didn't you?"  
  
She didn't flinch, answering swiftly and noncommittally. "No. I wasn't aware. Why?"  
  
Alex chuckled with dark skepticism and narrowed his eyes in two sharp, gleaming slits. "Jean-Paul and Jeanne Marie are in coma and can't give away to their assailant. What luck to you and Scotty, right?"  
  
"I don't understand what you... Look out!"  
  
The warning cry came too late, with tragic outcomes. The mutant animal stabbed with its claws to Havok, leaving four long gashes zigzagging along his backside. Alex howled in pain and crumpled on the floor, at the mercy of the scarred, burnt and very enraged animal.  
  
"Damn it!" Jean exclaimed, raising a telekinetic shield around Havok and lashing out to the beast with an invisible fist. The force blast struck down to the animal, and it focused its ravenous eyes at her. Exactly like Jean intended. "Run away, Alex."  
  
"I... don't need... your help." Alex stuttered through gritted teeth as he struggled laboriously to stand up. His legs denied obeying, and he collapsed down newly. Strings of blood trickled out of his dry mouth.  
  
"Excuse me but I'm not doing this for your sake, you know." She seethed. The animal pounced on her, but Jean rolled sideways, dodging its surge. Immediately she added her telekinesis to the momentum of its leap, shoving it in one tough column. The tremendous force of the blow dented and bent the pillar, and the roof quaked. "But for Scott's! Because your death would break his heart, who knows why!" She blurted.  
  
A dance began between human and beast, between brain and primal fury. Jean sidestepped, dodged and ducked from its blows, punches, bites and slashes, with the skill of a trained athlete, fast and deft. But she couldn't last, avoiding it eternally, and she did know. A single misstep and its strength and speed would end up the fight at once. She wanted blacking out its mind telepathically, but the overwhelming backlash of a simple probe nearly had killed her. Such was its revengeful ire and bloodlust.  
  
She intended finishing it off in the swiftest and most merciful way possible, but it wasn't going to happen. Its mind was too raw and primal for being easily shut down, and telekinetically the battle would be drawn-out, since the animal would withstand many blows and its rage would grow with each one. She remembered how Logan killed a mad bear once. He had intended being quick and clean, but the animal had endured long, prolonging its suffering. And Logan suffered along with it. (*)  
  
Her eyesight spotted several wires hanging on the ceiling. She snatched them mentally and they rushed towards the bear, latching around its limbs, trunk and neck, and coiling around them tightly. The misshapen monstrosity howled in fury and clenched its awesome muscles, straining the bounds.  
  
But Jean got the break she needed. She pictured mentally its large heart, thumping unceasingly and pumping carbonated blood in the lungs and oxygenated fluid in the main artery. She contemplated sorrowfully the vital organ, and with a rueful and determined thought, stopped it dead.  
  
In the physical world the mammal gurgled with a faint whimper, and its horrific power vanished. Its eyes, former pools of boiling fury, turned blank, and its limbs stiffened. The cables loosened, unwinding around it, and let it sliding down. It resembled a puppet with its strings cut.  
  
Jean approached at its bulky, square-snout skull and gazed in its bulged eyes. Light had withered and died out, but its hollow stare seemed locked on her, glaring her with accusation carved on the eyeballs. She trembled in behold of that denouncing and lifeless look and lowered her head. Inwardly she wondered to herself why she felt such appalling regret. All in all, that dimwit animal had been spared of further torment. Right? It had been a merciful deed. Right?  
  
Yes. And if she really believed that, also could believe little blue men inhabited the Moon. (**)  
  
Now lay at her feet the fresh corpse of another dead being. This time executed by her ruthless hand. And she pitied that poor animal. She was so fed up of so much pointless death. It surrendered her, swallowed and choked. She didn't believe the world was really meant to be like that. It just couldn't. No when she recalled a time of shining sun, green prairies, clean streets and smiling people.  
  
With a defeated, remorseful sigh, she left behind the poor tiger-bear and walked towards Havok. She regarded his appearance. His uniform was torn and coated in viscous blood and its back was a gory mess. The kevlar was tattered dregs displaying deep furrows where the blood seeped out. There were swells on his face menacing with turning purple bruises.  
  
Reluctantly she offered helpfully her hand. "Your back is a mess. Come on, rise up."  
  
He slapped it with a disdainful growl, though. "You had better to watch over your own back. Sinister isn't to protect to my brother longer. And there're transgressions can't be forgiven."  
  
Ignoring the puzzled fluttering of her cherry eyelashes Alex crawled on his knees, toppled, kneeled and began to arise. Trying pretending indifference, he shook off the specks of dust, dismissing the searing ache burning in his back and the dizziness the blood loss caused him.  
  
Jean folded her arms challengingly. "You talk is meaningless."  
  
He huffed and turning his back to her, stomped away. "You'll understand. Very soon."  
  
The fiery redhead stared at his hastily retreating form, wincing with the fresh wounds branded his racked backside.  
  
He had implied unerringly that he was aware of theirs little, lethal game. And perhaps he had even got rather good evidences, and using to Scarlet wouldn't delay the burst this time. If he could prove somehow that they were Apocalypse's foes, their lives would be worth of nothing. She could mock of him or spurn him contemptuously, but she didn't ignore how dangerous he really and truly was. Jean gulped saliva, afraid, and considered her options. Brainwashing him was discarded. She had done so in many previous times, and he could have acquired tolerance to mental manipulations.  
  
Of one or other way her instincts were screaming the end was close not matter what. The Apocalypse's plans, the Sinister's defection, the tangled Magneto's web... Too many things happening too fast in too many sides. Scott was right, the Armageddon was coming at great strides. And she might tell the Age of Apocalypse was running out of time. Likewise she knew her days in that place were numbered. If that end was due to her death or escape was regardless. But she had to run away for surviving. And she wouldn't escape without Scott.  
  
She cast a last glance full of regrets at the gloomy and frightened animals, locked behind rusty bars, and walked hastily out of the godforsaken kennel. Her forehead was creased with lines of a troubled frown.  
  
She was going to meet to Scott. Matters needed be arranged.  
  
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Once upon a time he had been named 'Mike-whatever' (he'd forgotten his own surname). A perfectly anodyne inhabitant of Chicago, with a common name, no steady girlfriend and a lousy job allowed him to pay his bills. But it had been a lifetime ago. Before the culls razed and flattened its hometown, and he was lucky enough to survive to the carnage. He had been deemed fit to survive and transformed into an Infinite. So what if his entire family had been purified? They were flawed and unfit, but he was worthy. Strong. He was a High Lord soldier, a weapon of the Justice and Purity, aimed at every puny flatscan.  
  
Somehow he didn't think being an Infinite involved patrolling along the thirty-feet-height rampart bordered the pens and cut them off from the ruins of the ancient New York. But there he stood, watching over the Sector Five gates and controlling the wagons rolled towards the entrance.  
  
Right now a truck was trundling along the rails while it approached, wheeling in slowly with a dangerous sway during its trudge. It was natural, since it was obviously overloaded with corpses.  
  
The Infinite waved his hand to catch his partner's attention, a rookie recently bullied by the High Prelate in mopping sewers, and both walked towards the wagon, which was steadily pulling in the stop. The soldier stalled while the vehicle braked fully, and slid the hatch open. He needed checking the scavengers inhabiting the shoreline didn't sneak into. What laugh, like if someone wanted going into...  
  
A tide of fetid stink greeted him. The inside of the wagon was shrouded in shadows, a pitch-black darkness with an overwhelming stench of death and foulness, so thick was almost solid and palpable. Its dense cloak enveloped the bag of stiff bodies, dangling immobile from the ceiling. Suddenly two purple-glowing slits opened in its bowels, shimmering with fury and hatred.  
  
The next Mike knew, purple energy flashed, and a blade swung towards him, drawing swiftly a dazzling loop while it severed his neck. His head, no longer attached to the trunk, dropped downwards and rolled along the soil strewed with debris.  
  
Frozen in paralyzing horror, his partner yelped and cocked his rifle upwards, but his movements were sluggish, like if he was swimming in treacle. Several star-shaped, energy-flaring shurikens darted from the shadows, imbedding in its forehead, arms and heart, piercing layers of armor like if they didn't exist ever.  
  
While the Infinite crumbled, falling on the ground, Elisabeth Braddock emerged out of the wagon, tossing her mane of rich indigo hair over her shoulder with disdain and nonchalance. What she was able of keeping such aloof calm just having slaughtered two men was eerie.  
  
Glancing at the two new corpses, Betsy pondered over it. The reeking slime of that fetid transport had warped surely her mind, she decided. However she had no time for introspective hesitations.  
  
She sprinted towards the gates, and approached to one tiny square where rows of keys lined up. Before killing to both soldiers she had extracted telepathically the alphanumeric opening code. Hers fingers rushed to type it.  
  
With a dull whir and a rumble of gears rotating, the towering gates opened steadily. Before the automatic shutting lock them down again, Betsy slipped into and instantly leapt in the shadows. Using her fabulous ninja skills she slithered along corridors and passages, dodging the monitors, knocking out several cocky Rooks and murdering any soldier enough daring, unlucky or dumb to spot her.  
  
She had just sliced the underbelly of an Infinite, leaving him kneeled on the floor with his innards spilled out, when an excruciating pressure hit her. Elisabeth staggered, swaying sideways while her hands clutched her head. She toppled onwards, but her quick reflexes flexed her legs into a crouch. Betsy remained squatted, groaning and puffing as she felt the entire pressure of an ocean weighing above her. It menaced with flattening her.  
  
It was an unwelcome and destructive sensation she had experienced through once in the past, when she was apprehended and dragged in the Black Tower. In there the telepathic power of the Consortium crushed her as a sledgehammer, fracturing her resistance in tiny powdered bits. Her conscience was too frayed and tattered to put up some fragile resistance. She barely was able of keeping afloat on the swirling vortex of numbness threatened with drown her in oblivion.  
  
But now she was ready, way readier. Instead trying raising barriers to hold back the unstoppable tide, Betsy mustered her forces, reinforcing her own will to think and fight, but letting the energy flux battered her mind. With dexterity born of experience she blended her mind with the routine mayhem of the astral plane, masking to herself like a swell, a puny fray on the thought fabric. Having set her camouflage, she began to rebuild her shields, brick after brick.  
  
The overwhelming flood ceased with such abruptness her physical self lurched violently. She panted compulsorily while she rose up, held by quivering legs. Her chest heaved with ragged and shaky thumping, and her head hurt a lot. Like if a mold was around it, and someone was squeezing it. But the burden was bearable now.  
  
Betsy resorted to hide in every nooks and crannies possible and available in her path, mindful of the necessity of keeping every her resources to hold in check the Consortium, having no energies to spend in meaningless confrontations. She lurked as a panther of beauty and grace along the corridors and spiral staircases leading towards the Sinister's lair.  
  
After of a hurried sprint she finally reached his dwelling. And gawked, surveying that artificial landscape, those wrecked ruins were a modern lab no long ago. She blinked as observed with agape amazement the walls molten and scorched, the hardware broken and the floor severely lacking of a good sweep.  
  
She had heard murmurs in the grapevine, but she had assumed they were phony speculations. Truthfully she couldn't pay heed to rumors swore Sinister had abandoned his genetic experiments, when he invested so many efforts in breeding them and nurturing them. Thus she had been skeptical, but she was wrong.  
  
Of course she wouldn't have believed either Sinister would hand over information to the X-Men, warning of the mad plans of his hallucinated master. The good doctor's secret journal ought to be really secret...  
  
The British ninja shook her head in annoy. Why Sinister had run away wasn't matter of her concern. She needed now a new plan, preferably where she wasn't killed. She couldn't convince to Sinister to stop to Apocalypse and set free the prisoners if he was away. Of course there was a backup option...  
  
Her finely tuned ninja senses ringed a loud warning and she whirled to face the danger, before the red wolf had been stalking her sprang from the shadows and pounced on her. Its prolonged claws were unsheathed and its drooling maw was widely open, displaying rows of sharp and long fangs.  
  
She froze it telekinetically in mid-air and swatted it aside with a sweep of her psychic katana. The large canine struck the floor with a yelp, and she leapt on top of it, stabbing its skull with the razor sword tip. The carnivore howled while blazes erupted out of the blade pinning it down.  
  
Nevertheless the energy was telepathic and acted only in a mental plane, knocking out to the animal instead of killing it. With a sweeping gesture Betsy arose and perused to the long-snout red-furred wolf while she picked up dust specks of her tight outfit.  
  
Interesting. Beneath that beast-like appearance shimmered a human conscience. Maybe in one time or place more suitable she might have examined properly the being.  
  
Her dimmed psychical senses warned her of the incoming danger too late to avoid it. While she pivoted around, struggling for build a shield, she cursed her clumsiness, not having caught on the trap in time.  
  
She shrieked when hot-melting plasma ripples struck her and charred her costume and skin. Her last thought before the world turned black was why he hadn't killed her right away.  
  
As he watched with barely restrained satisfaction to his hunt while she crumbled and lay sprawled on the littered floor, Alex stopped his explosive blasts with a flicker of his wrists.  
  
Havok walked towards the fallen heap. His blue eyes were leering at her, roaming along her body, but his look was lewd, no lecherous. His main emotion was delight with the defeat and capture of a foe had made a fool of him earlier, no lust for a gorgeous woman.  
  
He hoisted her in his arms and marched out of the lab carrying her fainted self. She would be another pawn to destroy not only to his brother but also to the X-Men.  
  
*********************************************************************************  
  
Tic. Tic. Tic.  
  
It was disturbing the way the drumming of the pen on the table might turn out so engrossing, Scott reflected as his hand tapped the pen on the desk with an unceasing up-and-down motion. So annoying as the relentless and steady thrum was, it helped to divert his mind from his main concern. He tossed aside the pen, letting it roll along the board, and picked up the report again.  
  
In few pages, Aaronson explained the McKenzie's arrest, the redhead his baby brother used to romp and amuse with very often. As Scott read and reread the file he sighed heavily, not only because Scarlet was an added trouble he didn't need right now, but also because he understood altogether the full implications of the 'idle footnotes' of the report.  
  
How the hell could they possibly blurt to Alex his secret affair, other than anything but secret, was with a spy of the Human Council? And how might they broach the thorny issue of the McKenzie's health state?  
  
Scott wondered briefly how Alex could be such unrepentant, hormone-driven dumb. If he intended engaging with a human, he should be careful with the protection. And with the allegiance of his partners, too.  
  
The repercussions of this incident were unsettling. Alex would take unkindly the news. He would be upset, afraid, shocked or enraged, pick up one option. His brother could be devising his downfall somehow, but this revelation could destroy all his plans and machinations. In his stupidity he had stomped on countless laws: fraternization with humans, collaboration with enemy -not mater what it was involuntary-, crossbreeding... to Apocalypse mating with humans was tantamount to bestiality, and any child born of human and mutant was a natural aberration couldn't be allowed live. The entire family was scarified, frequently for himself. Scott never got stomach to bear the executions, and Sinister labeled them as a genetic waste, but his brother usually enjoyed them. Scott had the inkling of he wouldn't do this time.  
  
And the idea of seeing to his nephew or niece charred to the bones wasn't appealing to Scott either. How would feel Alex knowing he would become father? Scott wasn't certain of which would be the Alex's thoughts. His own feelings on the matter were unclear. But he rejected the notion of seeing his kin murdered. No, if he might, Scott would fight so the Alex's offspring saw the daylight. Although that could not be so good stuff in this crazy world.  
  
Knuckles rapped softly on the door. Jean. Scott laid his paperwork on the table and sent mentally a beckoning nod to Jean, inviting her to go into. Meanwhile he'd file away his hesitations until the right moment.  
  
Her grave and slightly pale expression when she opened the door and sauntered in his office almost urged him to jump out of his seat. He suspected that perhaps that longed for moment had vanished.  
  
"Alex has come to see you, Scott. He wanted talking with you, and even demanded you go out to face him. I said him bluntly you haven't why obey him and he should wait on the threshold while I warned you." She stated with cool and noncommittal voice, only broken by the disgust she used to refer to Alex with.  
  
I believe the time has come She whispered in his brain with her mental voice, a rich and melodic tone.  
  
"Thanks for the assumption, Jean. Tell him what he comes to my desk if he wants see me so badly." Scott answered. Jean nodded briefly and walked briskly out of the room. When she returned, Alex was in tow.  
  
He seemed hugely satisfied and amused for anything, an insane joy and delight the offense apparently hadn't spoiled. Perhaps he thought it didn't matter anymore.  
  
Scott crossed his arms, summoning his sternest and most gruff expression, and looked down on him. "What do you need now, Alex? Shouldn't you be lounging in your private suite by now?"  
  
"Tonight no" He replied with a petulant smirk. "I have a lot of chores to look after since I'm going to take the reins of the Elite from now on."  
  
Cyclops displayed no reaction other than a spiteful snort, but the ruby quartz shielding his eyes shone intensely. "Have you been drinking excessively of late? I am in charge."  
  
His brother approached to him, slowly and ominously, until only few inches separated his noses. His leer focused fixedly in his visor. His hot breath tickled on his skin. "Give up. Both of us know you're a traitor. Well, you and your carrot-haired partner, albeit that's an obvious assumption."  
  
Jean Grey glowered with a forbidding growl would have impressed to Logan if he had heard it.  
  
Cyclops uncrossed his arms, putting them akimbo. The red lenses flashed ruby. His grimace twisted in a scowl. "You are crossing the border."  
  
Alex retorted with a snigger. There was something murky and eerie dancing in his eyes. A wild and dark glee. "No at all, Scott. Please, follow me to the McCoy's lab. I have to show you something."  
  
Scott rose his dark eyebrows. "You must think you've got me for real now, Alex. You are smiling like the cat ate to the canary." He spun away determinedly and strode towards his table, overcrowded with sheaves of nonsensical files, and thick wads of reports. People used to be amazed at the messy disorder of his desk, since they mistook him frequently by a neat freak. Actually he only kept order in the cabinets, never in his table. He didn't need really, since his spatial memory exceeded anybody else's one. "But I highly doubt anything you think you know about me be as juicy and compromising as this."  
  
He caught the folder of yellow covers he was flipping through earlier and tossed it nonchalantly at Alex. His blonde brother snatched it in mid-air, and with a suspicious glare of distrustful curiosity, opened the portfolio. As he read, his eyes bulged out of his sockets and his face blanched. He gagged.  
  
A sneaky telekinetic tendril pried the wad off his shivering, sweaty hands and laid it on the awaiting Jean Grey's hands. The redhead shot him an acrid glare. "Better I keep this for the current time. Otherwise your focus might slip and your powers can burn the paper without meaning it. And we don't want that, do we? Although I'm fairly certain of Scott made copies in foresight."  
  
Without further words she turned the first leaf and started to read attentively. Before long she was half-kneeled on the carpeted floor, guffawing uncontrollably, bursting in peals of laughter. Scott picked up the folder she had let slip on the floor, and after placing it onto his desk, he proceeded to give her soothing pats on her shoulders. Gradually she managed restrain her whole-heartily giggles.  
  
"God! What joke! And what fool!" She blurted.  
  
Scott gave to Jean a smiling beaming and turned to glare to Alex. His face was a mixture of fury and horror, both dueling for being the prevalent emotion, a stark contrast to his bold former attitude.  
  
"If you want showing me something, go ahead. Play your trump card." Scott stated.  
  
"Fine." Alex grated stiffly.  
  
The three of them marched out of the office, and headed towards the nether levels of the Tower. Led by Havok, they descended by bridges and spiral staircases wound downwards as a corkscrew, penetrating sinuously in the thick, pitch-dark darkness. Jean, who was fully controlled and observant already, got the weird sensation of being treading in the maws of a beast that was about of clamping its jaws around them.  
  
And when they were standing in front of the McCoy's den, she knew they were effectively putting theirs head into the lion's mouth.  
  
And Alex, who had apparently recovered remnants of his former forwardness, seemed extremely eager of carrying out this deal. His face was split in a shark-like and smug grin when his hand gripped the doorknob and pushed the gate.  
  
Scott and Jean went into the lair, feeling theirs hearts sinking with dread. Then they saw her.  
  
Elisabeth Braddock was manacled and shackled to one wall in cross-like position, glaring with disdainful and defying glare to her sinister keeper, Dark Beast.  
  
Theirs hearts skipped a beat. Both of theirs minds were reeling with the sight, since as it wasn't necessarily threatening, definitely it wasn't a good thing. Questions about what Alex had found or what Psylocke was doing in that continent raced hastily across theirs thoughts. Something alarming was going on.  
  
"Do you see what has found the cat? The infamous Elisabeth Braddock. Betrayer to her own race. Terrorist. Blaspheme. She ran into me when she was stalking in the Sinister's quarters." Alex, who had approached to the contraption while they were busy gaping at the woman, whirled towards them with a predatory smirk twisting his glossy lips. "You seem stunned."  
  
Unbeknownst to him, Dark Beast was watching gleefully the performance, perched on the top of a control board. His bulky frame swayed sideways pleasantly on his makeshift stool while his wicked eyes witnessed the stiff exchange between both siblings, with the sensation of contemplating a previously rehearsed play.  
  
"Stunned? You have no idea."  
  
"Let me guess" Alex aimed a finger straight to Scott. "Perhaps you have been working with those traitors since the redhead arrived here from the very first. Or perhaps earlier. Perhaps you were double-crossing us from the beginning, and the Grey's capture wasn't anything but a cunning plan to infiltrate a spy. I figure that genetic blunder was your newest contact. Right?"  
  
"You are reaching. That rubbish is nonsensical. And preposterous." Scott retorted acidly.  
  
"No, Scott. I have got a tape of both of you helping to that blonde brat Smith to escape. And it isn't the first time. I know you are guilty of many jailbreaks."  
  
It was like watching to two dogs snapping bites to each other, Beast reflected sagely.  
  
"If I'm mistaken, prove it!" He roared. Murderer glint shone on his eyes. "Execute to the rebel now!"  
  
And Scott answered. "No. I'm not under your command. I have neither reason to obey you, nor loyalties to prove you. Is that clear?"  
  
And came the long-awaited and foretold climax. Alex clicked his fingers. Following on that cue, Sam blasted from the shadows, hitting to the Prelate with the surge and the strength of a cannonball. He was heaved and tossed on the ground, and when he struggled for rising, the crushing massive fist of Elisabeth Guthrie smashed him, flattening him on the cracked land with hammering force. He moaned and fainted.  
  
Hank McCoy grinned insanely and hopped off his ledge, putting together his heels when his paws touched silently the floor. He leapt agilely towards the crowd, feeling a crazy joy partially caused for a lust of blood and revenge. Only a certain and clouded dizziness on his head bothered him.  
  
"At last my hour has come, after so many years looking to Sinister giving you everything whereas I was systematically ignored! The Elite is mine! I'm in charge!"  
  
There was something amiss in that picture. Something was going awry, a detail he was passing by...  
  
"Never I liked that boss. So sanctimonious, so self-righteous."  
  
"True, sister. We have fulfilled our part of the deal, Prelate. Fulfill yours now."  
  
"Of course. You have earned a promotion from Rook to Prelate."  
  
Where the hell was Jean Grey?  
  
"What are we going to do with your brother now? Kill him?"  
  
"No. Too easy. Too swift. I want he suffers. McCoy, get to the former Prelate and dissect him... or whatever."  
  
Suddenly his hesitations faded and the minor details were hastily forgotten. His squat frame crouched in front of Scott and his claws grabbed eagerly fistfuls of the dirt-stained dark-blue shirt. He licked his lips in anticipation, feeling laughter bubbling and bursting in his belly.  
  
"Oh, yes. Often Sinister used to brag about the rich genetic potential of the Summers lineage. I'm truly avid and impatient for examining a guinea pig with such pedigree." He brushed one cheek of the man with a long-pointed, sharp nail. "Alas, poor Cyclops. You ought to have foreseen what was befalling over you."  
  
"It's ironical you are telling that."  
  
That single short sentence startled to Dark Beast.  
  
Of sudden the face his eyes were looking at went through a transformation. Its outline blurred, and its lines turned younger, more roughened. The visor disappeared, and blinking blue eyes appeared beneath it. The long mane of locks suddenly began to shorten in a short-cropped haircut as the same time its rich-brown color brightened up in a silvery golden.  
  
And while the astounded McCoy gawked to the bruised Alex's face, a powerful crimson beam slammed him, smashing him against the opposite wall. When the blast stopped and Beast came round, a horror exclamation he couldn't restrain erupted out of his thick lips.  
  
The Guthrie siblings were slumped on the floor, obviously blacked out, and Psylocke, who he had supposed was efficiently disabled, stood behind them, brandishing parallel to the floor a katana of crackling purple energy that her fingers gripped tightly. And sprawled on the floor lay Havok, no Cyclops, who currently was glaring him with a fierce glow in his visor. Jean Grey stood behind him, while a red blaze flowed out of her forehead and coiled around Alex, freezing him with psychic shackles.  
  
"Just like I blurted earlier, McCoy, it's ironical listen to you saying that." He mused. "And funny. I told you clearly what I'd make you if you defied me again. I warned you."  
  
His lens let out a new dazzling blast, which blew to McCoy in the wall. Henry agonized and moaned in behold of the awesome strength of the hit.  
  
"I'm sure you are over-eager of knowing what has happened here." Jean interjected, never relinquishing her hold in the Prelate Havok. "While Scott was drawing your attention in him, I pried telekinetically the inhibitor off Elisabeth and debriefed her telepathically of the plan. Beforehand I had located to the Guthries, and thus when they attacked, Scott sidestepped, letting to Havok bearing the brunt of the hit. To two telepaths was exceedingly easy distract and deceit your puny brains."  
  
"Oh, yes." Betsy asseverated with glee. Her tongue flickered over the razor edge of the blade, letting sparks running along the rim. "Pathetically easy."  
  
"That's right. But please, don't give me undeserved credit." Jean joked, performing a dashing reverence at Scott. Nobody would tell she was utterly focused in her task. "Scott arranged the evil scheme instantly when he saw to Psylocke. Isn't he clever?"  
  
Betsy almost choked with guffaws, the only positive reaction the Jean's jokes got. Marvel Girl coughed twice and loomed over Havok, overshadowing him with her figure.  
  
"And regarding your suspects, Havok, you don't got right any of them. We aren't in cahoots with the X-Men, and Betsy isn't anyone's contact as far as I know. Nevertheless, you were partially right in ONE thing." Jean clutched rudely one handful of his jacket, nailing in him a chilled glare of gelid fury. He merely emitted muffled sounds through the gag plugging efficiently his mouth. His eyes were hurling her smoldering, poisoned glares of rage. "My arrival here was orchestrated. No by the X-Men or Magneto. Who disposed my defeat and capture I don't know, but I believe firmly was my fate come here."  
  
She shook her redhead head in grief. "Because you can be sure of I had broken into and got to Scott out long ago if I had known about him. He's a good person and he didn't deserve be surrounded by scum of your kin. I can just imagine what shit he had to put up with during years of Sinister's manipulations, Apocalypse's slavery and his own brother's hatred. You, vermin, are worthless of him."  
  
Steadily her voice had turned throatier and more ominous. A dull glow had flooded her piercing green eyes, and they were now glowing pools of ghostly ivory radiance. "And I've waited this for years now."  
  
Unseen forces hauled his body, and he floated towards the machinery where Betsy was trapped earlier. With furious, determined motions, Jean hooked him to the gear, strapped the wires around his limbs, locked the shackles around his extremities, and dismissing his scared glance, she turned on full power the unholy mechanism. Electricity emerged from the main generator and coursed along conductor cables.  
  
Alex screamed.  
  
Hearing his bloodcurdling howls, Dark Beast propelled his mass onwards, aware of what treatment he might expect of Jean, but the sharp touch of a sword tip grazing his throbbing neck sprang him back to his corner. Betsy stood upright above of him, narrowing in leering slits her vicious eyes. She pressed further the wicked-looking point of her weapon, stating clearly how little effort would take slice his thin skin, and puncturing his windpipe or chopping off his head unless he behaved.  
  
Other shape joined to her, and both cast theirs shadows on him. Grey. Beast felt a sudden, frosty splinter of dread stabbing and twisting in his gut. In between of both women he spotted to Summers, staring indifferent the scene was unfolding. He sported an emotionless expression, with his arms crossed in an idle stance, and yawning once on a while. For first time Dark Beast rued having ignored his threats.  
  
Jean savored greedily his blatant fear. Her glossy lips drew a baleful smirk and her fingers played with a rebel red curl. "Now is your turn, McCoy. I'm a telepath, do you remember? Whenever I trod into your crypt, the suffering of your victims blew my senses. Sorrow, misery, pain, ache, grief, lament, every kind of negative emotions coat and soak this place. Your den reeks to evil and oozes with death. Pain and sadism are carved in its walls and blood paints them. Neither my nostrils nor my stomach can bear that overwhelming stink. Do you sense it too, Psylocke?"  
  
The ninja nodded. She spread her hand towards Jean.  
  
"But it means nothing for you, right? You only care for yourself, right? Perform sadistic tortures with living beings is your only pleasure, joy and love, right? And use the science for justifying your sickening perversion, right? Don't answer anything. I know my chat is pointless. It means nothing to you. But I may do it means, do you know?"  
  
She took the Betsy's hand, gripping it tightly.  
  
"You have inflicted pain and torture upon innocent people without restrain or qualms for too many years, McCoy. But the thing you never knew was what felt your guinea pigs. It's past time to find out about it, don't you think? Let's give him a taste of his own medicine, Jean."  
  
The redhead nodded, and both women flashed and went up in psychic flames. Tongues of purple and red flames boiled and crackled around them, coiling around theirs limbs and licking teasingly theirs faces. Abruptly the ground beneath theirs feet shimmered with bright rose light, shaping an energy pool spread with a ripple until covering the entire room. Floor, walls, ceiling, columns and equipment. Slowly the glowing light withdrew, flowing back to both women. Tendrils of energy danced and clashed in front of them, entwining together and coalescing in a sphere of dazzling power. They spread theirs palms outwards, and blasted the pulsating globe towards McCoy, plunging it deep in his brain.  
  
He screamed, his mind overloaded with awful, devilish images of murders, maimings and bloodshed. He saw, listened, tasted, smelt and touched the death and the pain. Electricity singed his fur, whips flayed his hide and knives and scalpels racked and sliced his skin. Rough claws seized him and sharp objects poked in his innards. He was crippled, mangled and dissected among laughs his howls couldn't mask and wild grins his eyes couldn't forget. His brain was overflowed by the imagery he worshipped before, and it was far more horror than his erstwhile rational mind could cope with. He was burnt, electrocuted and dipped in acid thousands of times before his brain, unable of enduring it, shut off.  
  
Light turned off his eyes and strength left his muscles. He crumpled on the wall, turned into a numb heap slipped on the floor as a lifeless doll.  
  
Pushed by his nagging curiosity, Scott poked him reluctantly with the tip of the boot. No one movement. However his furry chest rose and lowered steadily. He eyed dubiously to both women.  
  
"Why didn't you shoot off his brains and got over with it already?" He asked, imagining fully well what they had done, and shuddering only thinking about it. "He'd be better dead in comparison."  
  
Both shrugged.  
  
"Too easy. Besides, I've wished do this for years now." Jean stated dismissively, and Scott gulped. Sometimes she could become scarier than her former and wild partner could. "Anyway we have right now more pressing matters. Why have you come here, Psylocke?"  
  
She didn't ask about what was going on between Logan and her. Mainly because she was frightened of the answer and of her own reaction. She hadn't straightened still her feelings on the matter.  
  
Scott glanced at the woman of purple hair and mesmerizing turquoise eyes, and used the brief pause to regain his leader mask. With it ready, he bore his sharp glare of piercing eyes in the ninja. "Yes, why have come from Eurasia, traveling across the ocean? Why have you risked to get captured again, knowing Alex seeks the hide of any X-Men? And why am I sure of your answer won't like me at all?"  
  
"Because you are smart. Either that or your instincts are remarkably good." Betsy remarked, keeping tightly shielded her thoughts and masked her emotions. The Jean's behavior and incensed Summers' defense intrigued her greatly, and she recalled her telepathic revelations back then in the tunnels, when she had felt the redhead was hiding something, even from herself. But she'd decide when play that hand, and this wasn't the proper time.  
  
Thus, she rushed to link theirs minds with her own brain, letting a colorful stream of images flowed in them.  
  
Scott and Jean blanched. The redhead was stammering weakly, while the Prelate was focusing his thoughts in one single line, studying his options and deciding the best course of action, thus triumphing over the turmoil was flooding his mind. Betsy had to give him that: He possessed very sharp wits and a mind very analytical, and wasn't afraid of using it. Moreover he was a master controlling his emotions and avoiding a possible foe read or guessed his thoughts. Other than a widening of his eyes -she guessed for the prone arching of his eyebrows-, he didn't show more outwardly reaction. And he seemed so quiet, so calm... His thoughts weren't beating her head, screaming loudly. She liked that trait in a man.  
  
Great. Now she was falling in for him or getting a crush or whatever. If Jean felt something deeper than friendship for him, some kind of special bond, she was beginning to catch on the reason.  
  
She shook her head. There wasn't time for rambling on. The nuclear attack was approaching perilously. Inexorably. Nearer with each second passed.  
  
"Listen, guys, I'm sorry seeming somewhat harsh, but we must hurry up! With Sinister unavailable, you are my -ours- only hope!"  
  
"Oh, my." Jean stuttered. "They can't... mustn't... they're crazy! And how can Logan aid them? Is he out of his fucking mind? He doesn't know-"  
  
Betsy laid a kind hand on her shoulder, stopping her ranting. When she spoke her voice was terse and reassuring, but with tough steel beneath the surface. "I know it's hard on you, Jean, but your disbelieving babble is wasting a time we lack of. So regain your wits or we shall perish." She snapped finally.  
  
Jean gulped, inhaled deeply, and shut her eyes. When she opened them again, her look was serious and focused.  
  
"All right. We are going to release the prisoners from the pens before Apocalypse forces to the Human Council to press the button..." Scott voiced.  
  
"... Or we shall die trying it!" Jean shouted, pumping up a fist.  
  
*********************************************************************************  
  
The Earth was shuddering.  
  
The battered and scorched land quaked and wavered as jelly. The hard ground shook with powerful tremors menaced with split it in thousand jagged rifts, and violent whirlwinds swept its ragged surface with uncontrolled force. Crackling blazes of golden, ravenous fire raged and danced viciously on the surface, licking the barren plain with its tendrils.  
  
And in the core of that chaos was a teenager boy, barely a man, who wielded a power defied description. His fragile body poured sheer psychic power, and the air, already crisped with the charring heat, sizzled around of him. His short brown and white locks were flowing upwards as underwater and his left eye flashed with simmering energy. Ironically he wasn't conscious of the maelstrom he was bringing about, since the entire wholeness of his incensed wrath was focused in a single target.  
  
The man who he was facing. The man he had trusted in. The person he had relied on when his surrogated father was being too harsh. The monster had killed mercilessly to his friends. He had been naive, arrogant and childish. But Forge and the people he loved were who paid the prize.  
  
Awful and unfair deaths he couldn't mend, nor even with his astonishing power. And the bringer of such desolation was right in front of him.  
  
He was feeling more enraged than never in his lifetime, a frame of mind wildly improper and dangerous to someone as mighty as himself, since in that state he was capable of anything.  
  
However, something was restraining his righteous rage. That man had just explained his origin.  
  
"Do you understand now, Nate? I am your maker. I spliced the DNA of Scott Summers and his perfect genetic match, Jean Grey, and blended it to build you. Slowly I assembled you and deaged artificially in a containment shell, watching carefully the process, feeling confident in the privacy of my secret lab. Unfortunately you father -who ironically knew nothing about you- rescued you when you were on the brink of your physical peak. It's because that you hold the power but no the maturity. I thought you were lost to me forever. Find you and track down took all my resources. Thankfully I was able of locating with Forge and his herd of outlaws before of my defection. Woefully that craftsman had tainted you for then."  
  
Sinister shook his head and glanced at Nate with eyes without pupils. Two slits of icy ruby color, hollow and soulless. Oddly theirs glow was dimmed with something akin to grief, matching his bleak and rueful expression. "I intended working out your potential. I expected honing your skills and tuning your power. I wished so many things... Alas, is too late for regrets. It doesn't matter whether you are ready or not. Humans and mutants are running out of time and chances. You must accomplish your mission."  
  
"My... mission?" Nate narrowed dangerously his eyes. A razor-sharp glint flashed in them.  
  
"Yes." Sinister stated matter-of-factly, grinning anticipatorily. "Kill to Apocalypse."  
  
Nate sensed to the two last surviving members of his circensian troupe, the grim and gruff Sauron and the beautiful and tender Theresa Rourque, stir in fear and lunge forward. He stopped them with a sidelong glance and a wave of hand.  
  
"Don't worry. I'll be done right away." He voiced reassuringly, reinforcing his petition with a tiny psychic suggestion. Then he whirled towards Essex, glaring him with intensity capable of obliterating mountains.  
  
"You have talked, Sinister. Now is my turn." He rasped through gritted jaws, feeling power building up in him. His body was simmering. "I'll speak and you'll listen. Listen carefully my words."  
  
Nevertheless the alpha-level telekinetic didn't speak anymore. Instead he darted onwards, pouncing on Sinister with the fierceness and swiftness of a leopard. His right fist, blistering in flames, arched back and struck the ugly Essex's face. A sickening crunch sounded. Sinister reeled with the attack, and Nate exploited the opening, ramming other crackling fist on his midsection.  
  
Sinister flew backwards and rolled along the floor, clearly amazed and caught off guard for the unbridled brutality of the attack. However his power was kicking in action already and healing the dislocated jaw and torn belly a second later of having been injured. Inwardly his analytical mind was dismissing the pain and praying the boy really used that impressive strength against Nur.  
  
"You talk about me and my life as if I mean nothing but a guinea pig, an interesting pet to experiment with and do away with after it has outlived its usefulness!" Nate Grey roared. "I am the NOBODY'S project! I'm not and I haven't been ever your puppet!"  
  
A tense and still silence pervaded the country.  
  
Sinister rose up, straightening slowly. He peered to Nate. His mouth twisted in a gruesome and mocking sneer. Self-assured and complacent. His eyes twinkled with it. "Perhaps your adventures along with Forge have granted you a sort of... autonomy. But don't delude to yourself. I've been waiting for this clash for too ages. I have absolutely no intention of allowing you stray away of your initial purpose. You are nothing, nothing at all, except a weapon. A weapon I shall aim to the Apocalypse's heart!"  
  
"LIAR!" The savage Nate's answer erupted out of his lips, and his fists exploded in a frenzy of rage and motion, blowing to Sinister unceasingly. The ripple of the rumbling sonic boom echoed across miles as a rolling thunder. Its alone force swept the land as a tidal wave, uprooting trees and rock boulders.  
  
And meanwhile Nathan Grey summoned and channeled raw telekinetic power in both of his clenched fists, unleashing upon Sinister a strength that world had never witnessed.  
  
"I have memories! And dreams! And hopes! And loves! Never mind whatever you say or how twist the reality! I AM NOT A WEAPON!" He bellowed as he hit him mercilessly. Like two piledrivers, his clenched hands pummeled and punished with insatiable ruthlessness the Sinister's shell, oblivious to his surroundings. And the way his power was tearing them apart.  
  
Fire roared, burning the air and charring the ground. Energy flowed and coalesced in his fragile psychic shell, feeding up his own raging power, and he used it throwing around to Essex like a broken toy. He felt mightiest than never, drunk with the releasing sensation of his unchained power. But harm him wasn't enough to quench his bleeding heart. His rage, his hatred craved for more. And his mind granted it.  
  
Of sudden Nate was seeing the universe at subatomic levels. The fabric of the cosmos unfolded around him, the elemental particles kept together the matter, strands tightly bound and linked wove a majestic tapestry. And he realized he had power to act over it.  
  
He spread outwards a telekinetic tendril, and gripped the molecules. He clawed and ripped in shreds the particles, cutting strands, snapping links and ravaging violently the subatomic particles. He went on destroying and obliterating atoms, feeling a bubbling glee as he did so. However that inhuman joy vanished when he watched recompose to the particles he had just taken apart. Realization dawned in him. That regenerating process had allowed to Sinister survive after of his brutal, unrestrained first attack.  
  
He was practically beaming when he canceled the capability, and sent a gigantic bolt towards the Sinister's core. The searing explosion blasted the subatomic realm.  
  
When Nate returned to his physical self he saw to Sinister sprawled along the floor. His body was a messed and butchered wreckage. Out of a large rift on his chest leaked a spring of oozing blood. Torn pieces of his body lay scattered everywhere, drenched in scarlet and smudged in dirt.  
  
And X-Man felt the fury had taken over his heart and ruled over his thoughts wearing off. Gone off the madness had tinged with red his vision, only there was an emotion left: grief. Unfathomable, helpless regret, sorrow and torment. The anger had left a hollow cavity on his chest. A gaping hole filled now with sadness and fear. Sadness because he understood revenge is meaningless: didn't return him to Forge and his deceased friends, didn't ease his pain and didn't seal the chasm nestling in his heart. And fear to the loneliness and to himself, due to what he had done in an instant of blind choler.  
  
He had killed. Mercilessly, wildly, gleefully. Just like Sinister would have wanted.  
  
Maybe that slimeball was right. Maybe he was nothing but a weapon with delusions of humankind.  
  
A point was true anyway. Revenge didn't set the things better. Still he felt that void carved in him.  
  
He was now empty, alone and aimless. He ignored what do or who turn to.  
  
No, it was wrong. He had a goal, a purpose. Like or not, he knew what ought to be done now.  
  
"All right, Sinister. You have taught me something. Apocalypse will come after me sooner or later. It's only a matter of time." He muttered with a sullen, resigned voice. "Except if I attack him before."  
  
He spun around and headed at his last friends with determination. He'd take care of Terry and Sauron, he'd watch they were protected. After he'd set off towards Manhattan. Towards his death, perhaps.  
  
However he was now a living corpse seeking a cause worth of dying for so it wasn't significant.  
  
*********************************************************************************  
  
He was dying.  
  
The very notion ringed alien to him. It wasn't that death was a concept strange to him. Certainly he had seen its pale, fleshless fingers gripping his dearest Rebecca and theirs son Adam. But when Apocalypse granted him his blessing/curse, he believed his demise had been procrastinated forever.  
  
However right now streamlets of abundant blood seeped out of the gaping hole tearing his metallic abdomen and dripped on the barren land beneath his body, filling a crimson pool. His glazed and bulged eyes ogled fixedly to the clouds rolling along the darkened sky. His breath was ragged and uneven, and his chest rose and lowered with excruciating difficult. Piercing sunlight hurt his eyes and bathed his mass soiled in grime. Life was slipping out of his grasp.  
  
Ironical. He had always expected Apocalypse would kill him if he discovered the ultimate goal of his experiments. But now, when he had accomplished his task, his own creation had destroyed him. He had seen to himself as Faust, but never like Victor Frankenstein. No, when his family was lost, slipping among his fingers as sand, he forswore to God and embraced the Science for finding a way of triumphing over Him. But at the end his family hadn't returned, and the science had betrayed him. God had won.  
  
He wondered, half-sunken in the void, if his subconscious had tried recreating a new family. He remembered to the Summers children, progeny of unbelievable potential. They had been his pawns from the beginning, but eventually he had come to care for them like the sons were denied to him. Alex, young, reckless and impetuous just like he was. Scott, mature, responsible and serious just like he taught him. And in love with a woman who was, without his knowledge, his perfect genetic match.  
  
Regrets crushed him. He would have wanted tell him how proud he had done him.  
  
He wanted having him told so many things. And teach him so many others...  
  
His eyelids shut down for the last time. Amidst the darkness he contemplated ghastly, blurry shapes. Gaseous and shapeless, like clouds. They spoke among themselves with odd, musical voices. Some whispered to him, mocking from him, scolding him or even pitying him. Shadows claimed him.  
  
*********************************************************************************  
  
It resembled a massive ant's nest of steel and stone. A colossal tower dwarfing the sea of surrounding buildings. Or a tusk stuck into the ground and tearing a gigantic and gaping wound on it.  
  
He barely recalled blurry sketches of what New York was like. He had been too busy running away along the sewers to notice on the scenery. And he couldn't imagine what the city had looked like before of Apocalypse. But the citadel, the stronghold, the Tower was unmistakable. It resembled a horn stabbing the Earth and spearing the sky, tearing huge scars in either of them. It reeked to evil. The Devil dwelt in it and oozed his corruption and pollution outwards, to sully and taint the remainder planet.  
  
At least that felt Nathan Summers -or Nate Grey-, hovering airborne above of the wasteland was named New York once upon a time. He drifted peacefully in the rushed and frozen-cold gusts of hurricane blew and howled at those heights of the atmosphere. His piercing and glowing gaze was tensely fixed on the city while he glided peacefully amidst the clouds of grime and smog.  
  
Abruptly his body twitched and he dove downwards, soaring towards the stronghold with rocket-like speed and drive. Propelled by his own power he launched his body in a crazy dash, piercing clouds and slicing the air like a bullet.  
  
Something was yanking from him. Or someone. Calling him, summoning, beckoning him. It was overwhelming. He didn't know how or why, but he was needed down there.  
  
He rammed in a lateral of the Tower like a shooting star, blowing up the entire section in smithereens with his blistering energy. His body drilled dozens of feet of thick layers of metal and concrete, until surfacing in one ample hall crossed everywhere with winding stairs and arched platforms.  
  
Mayhem was unleashed in the pens. Tides of people flooded the domed chambers, blending theirs shouts and cries in a deafening riot. Howls and screeches pierced the air. Virulent explosions rocked the walls. Bursts of fire charred ramparts and seared corpses. Soldiers with shining green armors and brandishing heavy arms against a crowd of haggard and filthy prisoners draped with tattered rags. Rounds of sizzling bolts pierced the battered bodies, killing dozens, but the rage drove to the people buried for years in the pens was beyond of imagination, and they attacked, clawed and flayed to the keepers with unheard-of frenzy, without care for theirs wounds. Blood spilled everywhere, coating the battleground, and innards and maimed limbs splashed on the large pools. Cadavers piled on the land and were stomped by careless combatants.  
  
Nathan was sickened with nausea. Something was stirring and churning in his stomach, and barely he repressed the compulsion of vomiting. Not even in his years wandering around the country and stopping by massacred villages he had witnessed such slaughter. He had to stop this thing. Fortunately the beetle-like, verdant armors branded nicely to his enemies.  
  
Sparks of golden flares crackled in his open palms as he built power, and Nate Grey slashed the air violently with his arms. An overwhelming shockwave was unleashed, sweeping the entire crowd and smashing in the walls to friends and foes alike.  
  
Nate winced. As always he was rash and thoughtless in his acts, and it ruined his good intentions. Instead of protecting to the innocents he had blown up to everyone. Why couldn't he be subtle?  
  
Suddenly he was startled when an explosion echoed behind him and something tough slammed a solid blow on his back. Nathan staggered on mid-air while sparks of scarlet light crackled and dissolved around.  
  
Drawn out of his brooding, Nathan spun around angrily, ready for blasting whoever had done that. His head tilted downwards and his eyesight sought to the assailant. He froze and his lips emitted a faint gasp.  
  
His bulged eyes were widely opened and firmly trained on the slim man of blue gear and the lean woman of red hair and athletic fit. The legs' man were flexed in a fighting crouch, while stared at him fixedly, and the woman was laying one hand on his shoulder, perhaps with soothing intent. He was so rapt in observing them he passed over to the stunning woman lurking in the shadows behind of them.  
  
And of sudden the lies and half-truths of Sinister didn't matter. He soared downwards with an artificial calm he used for masking his uneasiness, and landed smoothly on the ground. His eyes drifted from the man, who was giving him wary -or at least he thought they were wary- glances, to the woman, who he recalled from a brief and odd meeting in the psychic plane.  
  
Theirs pupils connected. Just in that moment something clicked in both of their minds. Light flashed as a connection, a link, was forged, and the feedback brought about a burst blazed on the astral plane as a nova before sending pain in theirs heads. They staggered with the onslaught.  
  
Cyclops didn't know what was happening. He'd just seen to Jean and the boy looking at each other, and now she had shut tightly her eyes and whimpered. Through the psilink tied theirs minds he sensed somewhat of the throbbing ache, and he startled. Because he knew he received her pain dulled, as an echo, but it was rather oppressive for giving him a dizzy and staggering sickness. It panicked him, and Scott acted hastily for first time in his life, blasting again to the boy, this time on his midsection.  
  
Nate was hurled backwards and dropped heavily back down. He crawled clumsily on his knees, while Scott kept his crouched and stiff stance, perusing meticulously to the boy in case of he needed unleashing another ruby bolt. Of sudden a delicate hand laid on his shoulder plate and yanked slightly backwards. He turned to gaze at the worried Jean's frown.  
  
"No, Scott. This boy's... a friend."  
  
"How?" He retorted in puzzlement.  
  
"Yes." She stated. "He's the telepath I talked you about back then."  
  
She stood suddenly speechless, staring forward with sorrow.  
  
And not only that, right? The Nate's voice mumbled quietly in her head. She felt it as a hoarse echo the wind dragged burden with large grief. She was distraught, not only for the pain haunted to the boy, but also because she felt still that familiarity with him, like a ribbon entwining in her heart and her soul. Like if she knew him and owed him happiness. I've only spoken like this with another person. And he... isn't longer  
  
I can see you're special... And now you're alone Jean opened the channel so Scott and Psylocke were able of listening her likewise. Do you want come with us?  
  
Nathan shook in denial his head and rose up, wiping off the dust soiling his jacket. "No. It seems that my entire life there has been someone telling me which was my fate. And I've been that whole time running away from it." With each word he spelt his right fist was clenching slowly in fury and determination. "Too much people has died. People I loved. And I owe them as well as myself do what I'm supposed to do."  
  
Scott stared him thoroughly, finding to himself impressed by the fire flaring beneath that youthful exterior. His blue eyes studied carefully to the boy standing in front of him. His long brown and white locks cast shadows in his face, but he guessed the expression his eyes displayed. That stance, that attitude... "You're... right. The time has come... of getting this fight over with."  
  
Somehow he knew what the kid was speaking about. And he felt a strange, quizzical kinship to him.  
  
Betsy, who they'd thoroughly passed by so far, stepped between both, looking sweaty and strained. "By the moment you've helped us plenty." She wheezed. Her breath was unsteady and laborious. "Your intervention has allowed Marvel Girl and me stabilize our hold onto the multitude. When we released to the prisoners they went predictably wild, more interested in getting revenge than in running away with us. But now we have calmed them down and can lead them to the exit."  
  
"Then... are you going to run?" Nate questioned, incredulous.  
  
"We've fought enough already. Our task is over." Jean voiced. "Now we have the duty of saving the remainder innocents while other people take charge of the war."  
  
Nathan got thoughtful and nodded gradually. "True. When this ends, if I keep alive, I'll look for you."  
  
Nate whirled around and began to sprint in direction to the Tower. With a fluid motion he took off and soared skywards, at the peak of the tall horn. "Take care of yourself!" He listened to Cyclops screaming.  
  
Down in the ground Scott Summers felt an unexplainable and sudden homesickness while he stared to the dark shape of the boy dwarfing gradually. Somehow, in his heart, he realized in other world they not only could have been together but they should have been together. He didn't know how, only did.  
  
A hand wrapped softly around his arm. Jean tugged from him imperiously. "Scott, we have to go."  
  
"I know, Jean. It's only that... I remember to that kid. Years ago I helped him to escape from the pens. And even in that instant, for some motive... He remembered me to myself."  
  
Scott shut up, lowering slowly his head in reflection, thus missing the curious and lightly startled Jean's expression. She had sensed exactly that when she met to Nate in the astral plane.  
  
Betsy quirked a brow, studying the interaction that pair had, and wondering about the meaning of the Prelate's words. She wished understanding fully well what mysteries had lurked in that hellpit. And what ties bonded to Jean, Scott, and that kid whose apparition gave her shivers along her spine.  
  
"Let's go" She mouthed, leaping on the lower level. Her partners nodded and rushed to keep up with her.  
  
Meanwhile, Nate had blasted towards the summit of the spire, flying in a whirlpool of golden blazes, and had crashed roughly on an invisible barrier. He dropped downwards with the impact, momentarily stunned, but his telekinesis halted abruptly his fall. He stared ahead, and saw the air and the light rippling and warping along a curvy surface around the upper half of the horn. A protector shield.  
  
He clung fiercely to the round column and began to climb upwards, with the tireless tenacity of a hellhound smelling to its prey and tasting its blood. His claw-like fingers nailed to the metal layers, digging deep dents on them, and the air sizzled and boiled around his body. He was shrouded in searing fire and steam.  
  
The wind in those heights was a chilled hurricane, and the oxygen was scarce. The teasing sweat glued his clothes to the skin and a headache was throbbing in his temples. It didn't matter to him. He only cared for his hatred.  
  
"I'm after you, Apocalypse!" He shouted with a high-pitched howl.  
  
The chilly wind dragged the echo across the ancient New York, and many souls wondered what it meant, and if it was the sign of the liberation.  
  
*********************************************************************************  
  
Dazzler never had been one of the main acquaintances of Rogue, neither had known her for years now. Her partners had told her she used to be a very lonely, close-mouthed and saddened person, and her mood improved after getting married to Magneto. She had seen her through many emotional states: ire, lament, joy, gravity. Nonetheless Allison had never seen her more somber and more troubled than in the last days. And she had never seen her as angry and choleric like now.  
  
The blonde ex-singer supposed, while she struggled for restraining to the maddened woman, her husband and son's kidnapping hadn't helped to her mood, already edgy and snappy with the possibility of her world was nothing but a lie. Right now Paris and she were having troubles to keep seized to Rogue, since in her choking and blistering rage she wrestled violently for disentangling from them, lunge at Gambit and vent her fury upon him.  
  
And whereas the Cajun thief wasn't her favorite person, they didn't want him -for the current moment, at least- bleeding to his death.  
  
"Gambit, son of... You let Guido take away to my son!" She bellowed, surrounded for hers loyal troops.  
  
"He was the only might get to Charles out of that hole still alive." Her interloper replied tiredly.  
  
Remy was performing in that moment a great study of his shoelaces. His head was lowered and his long brown locks shadowed his sunken eyes. He didn't dare to look eye-to-eye to Rogue, or to speak again. And thus he remained sprawled on the debris with a miserable, pitiful aspect. Very unlike of his usual attitude of charming bandit. Brass, carefree and roguish.  
  
"He had no choice, Rogue" Allison interjected, hoping her reassuring words reached to the hysterical woman. "At the very least the little Charles keeps still alive! We can save him!"  
  
Lila Cheney, the likewise ex-singer had remained still and quiet, preferring keep a low profile, stepped forward, shattering her silence. "It's right. If you want hating to someone, Rogue, hate me, no him. Remy lost to your son and the shard for saving my life."  
  
"No way! She has no right to blame to Gambit!" Jubilee shouted suddenly, raising a balled fist to the front. Taken over by rage, she stomped angrily towards the brunette woman, and grabbed roughly her cloak's folds, forcing her to her eye level. The effect of the tiny teenager holding to the older woman, with a fury matched Rogue's, was almost comic. "Have you forgotten already what you did to Gambit years ago? You know, like save to Magneto and let to Gambit in the clutches of a psychopath murderer! He has traveled to the edge of the screwed galaxy, has broken the glue held together the universe, has risked our lives for bringing that stupid stuff... for you! He's capable of anything for a person who doesn't care for him at all, and when he chooses being selfish for once, you try killing him! You're a real bitch!"  
  
The strong, callous words of the teenager had the effect of a cold water bucket upon a bonfire. Rogue collapsed on her knees, feeling her overwhelming fury drained and worn off, substituted for a flood of shame, awful fear and sobbing grief. A grief was drowning her.  
  
"My son and my husband in the clutches of that devil!" She choked. "Oh, my God!"  
  
Allison hugged her, but she didn't notice of the tender arms cradling her.  
  
Piotr Rasputin regarded the scene playing in front of his eyes with a pained frown, and surveyed the crowd with his sight. Gambit hadn't brought with himself the M'Kraan, but he'd carried it to the Earth. Kurt and the woman named Destine were keeping to themselves out of that dramatic picture. His partners were pretty exhausted and worn cause of the fruitless conflict and the long and tiresome battles they had waged, but mostly fine. His little sister was wrapped around his leg, with his tiny digits clutching fearfully the leather. She was curious but very scared. And his wife, Katya, was staring to Rogue while her cigarette burned slowly into silvery ashes. She wouldn't look at him even.  
  
She hated him now? Perhaps she did. Perhaps she hated him as badly as he hated to himself. She ought. To him theirs students were nothing but soldiers to train. In Seattle he had cared for and protected to his sister and his wife, only. And now they were dead because his egotism, overconfidence and foolishness. Theirs blood dousing his hands. If he were just able of traveling back in time and make it better... but speculations were now meaningless and useless. However a lingering doubt was nagging him. He was inwardly hesitating about himself, wondering whether his stand hadn't changed him in something worse than an Infinite. And the very suspect got him paralyzed with dread.  
  
"My sister, Destine, and the glass shard" He sighed. "Although it seems impossible, every of the Magneto's plans have succeeded."  
  
"Yes." Victor Creed growled sarcastically, incapable of shutting up his hurtful and callous statement. Neither he tried it to start with. "Everybody did what was asked they did -except LeBeau, what surprise-, so that... What are we going to do now?"  
  
Unexpectedly his words seemed spark back a flare alive in Rogue. The woman abruptly bolted up and on her feet, and her glaring eyes swept to her X-Men with a glance. "Now, Creed, we shall do what the universe demands! You win, Bishop" She eyed thoughtfully to the muscular black man with nicks and scars crisscrossing his hide. "If there had been really a cosmic cataclysm, if that world of yours isn't a crazy dream, let's make it real. That time CAN'T be worse than this, not matter what some can lose. Tonight ends the Age of Apocalypse!" She roared.  
  
Pietro nodded vigorously. Impelled by an odd compulsion he began to walk slowly at the direction of New York City, while the dusk began to glimmer on the sky. Behind him the X-Men followed his trail.  
  
"Let's get back the M'Kraan Glass shard" Quicksilver stated silently, with a face as stony and unyielding as his unbendable determination. In that moment he was the spitting image of his father. "Let's rescue to my father and my brother. And then we shall do what always the X-Men do. We shall give everything... even our own lives, for managing today be the day Apocalypse falls."  
  
The mutants were watching him and following his lead nodded. Rogue, Sabretooth, Wildchild, Sunfire, Blink, Morpho, Marrow, Exodus, Storm, Dazzler, Iceman, Polaris, Nightcrawler, Colossus, Shadowcat. Even odd companies as Bishop, newcomers as Destine or Illyana and awkward allies as Gambit, Jubilee and Lila.  
  
All ready for the last spin in the roulette of the fate. Every ready for shedding theirs last blood drops.  
  
They are mutants. Feared and hated by the people they save. Loathed and chased by the people they protect. Doomed to fight for a dream, earning the hatred of theirs own kin and the humans in every world.  
  
In every time and place they are outlaws. Outcasts. Rebels.  
  
But first and foremost, now and always, they are heroes.  
  
They are the X-Men.  
  
*********************************************************************************  
  
End of Part Five  
  
(*) That scene references, in the Marvel Universe, to Limited Series Wolverine, first issue. Written by Chris Claremont and drawn by Frank Miller, it's the first Logan-based limited series ever.  
  
(**) According to the Marvel Universe's Chronology the Kree aliens made the Blue Area of the Moon millennia ago. Thus Jean doesn't know the Moon was inhabited by blue men, indeed. 


	6. The Downfall of the Gods

  
  
Age Of Apocalypse: Shifting Times  
  
Author: Jenskott Summary: In an alternate AOA, Weapon-X never rescued to Jean Grey from the pens. That single fact changed the world.  
Notes: I said I hoped this part took less time, didn't I? Sigh. My humblest apologies to my readers -including the one wrote me when I was away on holydays and without one computer at hand-, but real life got in the way. And besides I was unsure of how writing it. I wasn't satisfied with the first drafts, and if I don't like the text, I prefer no post it. Besides, there was other ideas tempting me, and I write faster when I get the picture clear in my head. Fine, I hope it was worth of the waiting, at least. And if someone is still reading me, please send e-mail me or write me two lines at the very least. Feedback motivates and encourages a lot when you write.  
Rating: PG-13.  
Disclaimer: Sadly they belong to Marvel Comics.  
Feedback: To Very cherished and appreciated and beloved. However English isn't my native language, therefore forgive my very obvious mistakes. Still I'll thank polite advice.  
  
Part 6. The Downfall of the Gods-  
  
A tiny, flickering spark touched a glossy, translucent surface.  
  
A golden ripple glided over the even, crystalline plane, cut with rhomboidal shape.  
  
Light spread over the glass, a shard chiseled with perfect diamond shape. And on every edge it split in beams of thousand rainbow-colored streaks, filling the adjacent face with strias of another hue, flashing and flickering like blazes. Each side of the diamond vibrated and hummed with its own rhythm, everyone mingling in a strange song of primal and unearthly beauty. And on each square flashed a different timeline. Infinite possibilities of endless moments weaving the tapestry of the eternity.  
  
Spikes of light jutted outwards from the core of the glass, shimmering with the entire range of shades of each color. Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. The beams crossed with each other, crackling with electric sparks at each intersection, entwining in a gleaming energy sphere. Blinding glow pulsated within it, and with each quivering throbbing, with each thumping shudder of the glass, the globe grew and grew, ravenous of power, filling the vast chamber and bathing its edges with its holy light.  
  
And contemplating the magnificence of that glorious brightness was a towering monster. The light played tricks on its monolith body and on his stone-like face, split by a smug smile lit up his greedy, soulless eyes. Quietly he watched the different events flashing on each streak of the shard, his mind dwelling on evil thoughts.  
  
He spun around 180 degrees, pompously tossing backwards his crimson cloak as he gyrated, and faced to his long-time nemesis with his perpetual and sardonic grin of utter belief and trust in his superiority and invincibility. Magneto would have spat on his boots but he preferred keep intact his dignity.  
  
Certainly his dignity had lived better days. But even now, dressed in a tight black suit, beaten mercilessly, with his face bloodied and his body bruised, kneeled -since his legs wouldn't hold his body- in front of his mortal foe, Erik denied to the bastard the satisfaction of giving up. Thus he kept his smoldering glare focused on Apocalypse, basking in his supply of hatred to lend him strength. He would rather fueling in his love by Rogue, but he wouldn't plead to Nur show her face to him again. He wouldn't give in one inch.  
  
No one inch.  
  
His flesh might be fragile and his limbs limp, but his spirit and his determination were unbreakable. Unyielding. Unwavering.  
  
Apocalypse would NOT win this, with or without the glass. He would find a road to the victory. And although it was impossible, he wouldn't surrender. He owed it to Charles. To the world.  
  
Besides, if Apocalypse had set up a trap to his X-Men, they needed him. He couldn't fail them again.  
  
"The game belongs to who are better prepared, Magneto." Apocalypse voiced with his stupidly self-satisfied, mocking grin. Erik yearned for wiping it out his face. And wiping HIM in the process. He prayed to God for strength for standing up. "Hours ago my Madri forewarned me that glass would jeopardize centuries of work if I was such fool to permit your X-Men approached to him. Thing I am NOT."  
  
"You could have fooled me." Erik sneered malevolently.  
  
"SHUT UP!" Apocalypse roared, backhanding him. "You live permanently fooled, Magneto. Don't you understand yet? I WON! The world fits in my vision of him. And everything develops according to my will. Now and forever, since I was born in the Egyptian dunes and until the end of time, I AM-"  
  
"Sir! Sir!" A double-headed man of ragged appearance burst into the chamber, almost stumbling on the threshold. His breath was shaky and uneven, and his half-naked torso was sweaty. Telltale signs of his haste and his panic. "The South Western kingdom... it doesn't exist! It has vanished! It isn't longer!"  
  
"What?" Apocalypse glanced sideways, frowning in a grimace of puzzlement and disbelief very unusual in him. He was dumbfounded, an emotion he wasn't fond of feeling. He turned towards another of his minions, hoping settling that matter. A minor nuisance, he was sure. "Rex, what is he babbling about?"  
  
"M-my Lord, it's true." His raven-haired informant stuttered in extreme nervousness. "The Council has managed throwing its bombs in North America. The whole West... is a radioactive crater right now!"  
  
Magneto gagged, appalled in that monstrosity. "My God... millions of lives. What have you done? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?"  
  
Apocalypse swiveled his eyes at him. His face was grimmer and darker than usual. And when he spoke, although the tone was disdainful, the words sounded raspy, like if he was chewing gravel. "The question rather is: What must we do now? Reply? Rex, deploy the defensive grid of the Atlantic Wall... Now!"  
  
"But my Lord... The consequences..." The poor, fainthearted man shivered. Glacial cold chilled him to his bones.  
  
"Everything is part of a grander scheme. Do it!" Apocalypse bellowed, losing his temper.  
  
Too impatient -and sure of the fear he inspired upon- for checking if his servant rushed to oblige him, he focused his undivided attention on Magneto. His right fist clenched firmly, and flares of power gathered and coalesced among his fingers.  
  
He opened his hand and aimed the fireball at Magneto. His face was darkened in murky shadows.  
  
"Well, Magnus, I intended you lived enough for watching your dream to die, but seems I have no time for such indulgence-"  
  
Of sudden, pain. A scream erupted out of his lips when something tough and sharp and intangible struck him. An unknown force clamped unseen tentacles around his frame and tossed him roughly backwards, almost with diffident scorn. His body rolled along the floor, until crashing on the opposite wall.  
  
"You got that right, ugly." A voice reverberated from the shadows. A young voice loaded with wrath.  
  
"Who... who are you?" Apocalypse grunted, panting while he extricated his mass out of the dented titanium. The brutal hit had winded him, his vision was blurry and he felt fairly dizzy. He didn't recall the last time he had received such hatred-boosted strength.  
  
Shadows stirred and rippled. A figure stepped slowly out of the ebony blackness shrouding it as a protective and thick coat. A young boy. Barely an adult, daring to defy to En Sabah Nur.  
  
"The nail on your coffin, Apocalypse. You take away me all who I loved." He mumbled gravely. No mood lit up his stern and gloomy grimace. "Time for returning you the favor."  
  
Tendrils of slick darkness slipped out of him, and his body began to give off a golden light. A nimbus grew and blossomed in a flare of dazzling brightness. Air sizzled around him, and a gust of wind arose, gyrating around his body. The whirlwind dragged the blistering blazes, and a vortex took shape.  
  
Magneto rose up laboriously. A magnetic pull snatched his narrow helmet. "Y-you are the mutant Forge promised hand over me someday."  
  
Nate nodded quietly, even though he didn't know what was Magneto talking about. Neither he cared it. "Stay back, old man. This isn't your fight anymore."  
  
Magneto fitted firmly his helmet, hiding his face in shadows. However his furious eyes, two swirling pools of fury, shone with cobalt electricity, and his jaws ground together with a scrapping noise. His lips let out a snarl. "Nonsense, boy. You have just bought some pretty seconds to the universe. We shall exploit them to the utmost... together."  
  
Apocalypse and Holocaust regarded quizzically to the newcomer, a new player they utterly knew nothing about. How could they have passed by him?  
  
To know how Nate had stormed into the upper level of the fortress, we need travel back in the time.  
  
The old city's subways were an intricate network of tunnels interconnected with numberless stairs and passages, spread along miles beneath the skyscrapers of the city. When the upper levels were abandoned, the Morlocks established their dwelling down there, caring little for the loneliness and the lacking of light and warmth. Progressively, through the years, they dug new tunnels, burrows and pathways, clearing obstructed trails and building new halls.  
  
But they were exterminated, and the subways abandoned altogether.  
  
Now it was a labyrinth of murky passages, where the light was dim in the best of the cases. The floors were cracked and strewn with rubbish and rubble, and there were pools of muddy water everywhere, dripping of shattered gutters and leaks on the rock. The time and the neglect had corroded and eroded the stone and the concrete and rusted the metal, damaging badly the structure. In many places the ceiling had fallen in and the ground had caved in, blocking the tunnels with piles of boulders and debris, or holing them with gaping pits of bottomless blackness. In the areas still intact the walls were unstable and shuddered and quivered dangerously with each explosion rocked the world above.  
  
In one of those ratholes, the boulders obstructing a road quaked silently. Gradually they rolled downwards, or flew out of the way, leaving a free pass without compromising the tunnel's stability.  
  
A tide of haggard people walked through it, limping or crawling. Neither of them, not even the most badly injured, dared to do anything hindered or delayed the walk. They acted like if all the Devils of Hell were chasing them.  
  
Scott, Jean and Betsy supervised the evacuation standing aside as the flow of people marched through the doorway cleared by Jean. While the hopeless souls walked, they watched attentively and conferred among low whispers.  
  
"Are you fine, Jean? You look a tad worn out" Betsy wondered in concerning, regarding the pale and sweaty countenance of the redhead. She seemed practically drained.  
  
"I-I'm fine. I'm exhausted of using my powers. That's all." Jean stammered.  
  
Psylocke casting uneasy glances at her, worry shining on her pretty purple irises. Since the jailbreak, Marvel Girl and herself had spent their energies in destroying the Consortium, releasing the prisoners, lead them peacefully, and battling soldiers. Both of them were very tired, but Jean seemed about of fainting.  
  
"It's normal you're tired. You've been fighting toughly for long. But we need your telekinesis for clearing the path on the securest and quickest way" Cyclops stated neutrally. "The walls are too punished for using my blasts, and removing manually the rocks would consume a time we can't afford of wasting."  
  
Psylocke blinked. She had noticed a hint of concern underneath that layer of impassivity, but still... "That sounded incredibly aloof and callous, Summers." She snapped acidly, remembering his rash and frantic attitude when Jean was in danger.  
  
"I'm very good turning off my human side in the job. Didn't you know?" He retorted dryly.  
  
"Stop that meaningless argument." Jean seethed, caressing her bulged forehead. That pair was giving her such migraine. "This is the way. Right, Psylocke?"  
  
"Right, Jean. And please... Call me Betsy." The British woman uttered softly, recalling how they had descended in the sewers and reached the subways afterwards. They had been lost without her down there. Cyclops remembered partially the Morlock tunnels, but Marrow had sketched a full map of the galleries, and her eidetic memory had recorded it. "Follow this passage, and you'll arrive to the Grand Hall. All passages converge in it. You can go at anywhere from there. I wish you luck."  
  
"What do you mean 'you'? Aren't you coming along?" They inquired, puzzled.  
  
"No." Betsy shook her head and sighed. Her hand stroked her indigo curls plaintively. "I've a feud to settle up with someone still. Besides, my task was help to the prisoners. Now you're taking care of them, I'm free for aiding to the X-Men. If I die, I choose perish with my friends, giving birth to a new world."  
  
Before they inquired further about her words, whom real meaning they couldn't suspect, she whirled around and strode back to the pens. "If Magneto succeeds, and if all of us survive, maybe I'll see you around someday."  
  
And so, she was gone.  
  
While Betsy sprinted swiftly along the tunnel, well aware of this was the last time they saw at each other, she believed sensing something amiss for a split-second. Something familiar and eerie. Stray amidst the chaotic thoughts of the refugees. An odd compulsion, a brusque feeling of foreshadowing horror, clutched her. And she reconsidered her decision of leaving them alone.  
  
She studied the rows of men and women, shuffling sluggishly along the narrow and low cavern as wandering wraiths. Her sharp and keen eyes scanned attentively the group, while her butterfly-like spirit probed random minds. She searched for anything amiss, a displaced detail, some hostile mind. Nothing.  
  
Whatever or whoever was eluding her perfectly. Reluctantly she turned her back and ran out of there.  
  
Shortly after of the Betsy's departure...  
  
A gloom, threatening shadow cloaked temporarily the sun.  
  
The sudden loss of light startled one of the misshapen soldiers of coriaceous bronze skin, big horned head and dwarfed body. He craned upwards his neck, intending spotting the possible intruder, and clicking the safety of his large cannon off. He saw dimly a dark figure looming above him, shaded with the sunlight that came from behind. The winged shadow gyrated in paused circles around the sky as a vulture locating a prey. The disturbing visitor gave off a fierce sensation of threat, and the mutant felt shudders coursing his spine.  
  
The figure soared downwards slowly, nearing steadily until the guardian could make out his face. He exhaled a relieved sigh, and immediately felt a fool for frightening. It was the Angel. The golden-curls boy lived in his silver-bars cage dangling on the clouds, never daring to descend to Earth to soil his shoes or break his nails. He lowered his weapon disdainfully.  
  
He missed the signs: the clothes muddy and tattered, the enraged grinding of jaw, the piercing light flashed murderingly on gleaming blue eyes. It wasn't a defenseless dove now but a rampaging hawk.  
  
"What do you want now, pretty boy?" His partner barked impatiently, obviously not wanting wasting time with him. "Apocalypse doesn't welcome guests."  
  
"You arrested to my worker, Karma. I'm going to see her." He stated with dooming voice. Drawn out his smiling mask of phony pleasantness, his face sported a frowning and grim glare, laden with writhing anger. But that sign was missed in them likewise.  
  
"Screw you. You aren't allowed in-"  
  
Warren propelled his body downwards, connecting a solid flying kick on the gnarled mutant's forehead. A sickening crunch burst when his skullbones fractured and the shards incrusted into the brain. The jailer gurgled faintly, hurling a gruesome blot of blood, and he crumpled on the floor.  
  
"I wasn't requesting, troll!" Warren yelled. His body somersaulted onwards, and as his feet touched the land, his hand tossed a sharp-pointed object towards the second guardian. It struck his wrist, eliciting a pain squeal and forcing it to let go his weapon. Warren lunged hastily on him.  
  
Frightened and cowed, the monster threw a tentative punch on Warren when he approached, connecting the jab on his midsection. His sturdy fingers crashed on a bulged surface of solid and round muscles rippling beneath the skin. The delicate bones split and he shrieked again.  
  
Warren glared him balefully. "Did you seriously think your puny hits could affect me? I can lift up my own weight plus other person's, and fly at high speed a long distance. How strong do you think my muscles must be for pulling that?"  
  
Swiftly his hands grabbed rudely his head. His fingers clenched tightly his throat, digging furrows on his hide and throttling his windpipe. Warren twisted the neck 180 degrees around, ripping it off his trunk as a corkscrew. The head popped out as a bottle's stopper.  
  
Without paying attention to the obscene and sickening sound, Warren Worthington, the Archangel of the Death, never again the Avenging Angel, rushed to the contraption where a heap alarmingly equal to his friend was hooked in. The unfortunate girl was half buried beneath layers of thick machinery.  
  
Warren untied slowly the straps, and winced, observing the battered and quivering Karma's form. She was a mess, riddled with bruises and smeared with blood. She wheezed shakily with faltering gasps, and her soft chest raised and lowered unsteadily, with great difficult. Her eyes were shut firmly, but she struggled for opening them when she sensed arms catching her and cradling her soothingly.  
  
Her violet eyelashes fluttered, and she finally managed parting her eyelids. The dim light seemed hurt her, though, and Warren frowned, perusing attentively her blank look and her dilated pupils.  
  
In that instant Warren knew she was going to die.  
  
"W-Warren" Karma stuttered faintly. Her glazed eyes blinked wildly, trying focusing the blurry image in front of her. "I'm sorry" She coughed, feeling gradually weaker. "I've disappointed you... Despite of everything you taught me... about haggling and bargaining..." Another coughing fit. Red droplets stained his spotless white jacket. "I helped to Apocalypse... in exchange for nothing... free..."  
  
Her frayed voice died away. Light on her squinted eyes dimmed until snuffing out. Her head dropped backwards and her body turned a numb corpse of slack muscles. Pretty soon her limbs would stiffen and her body heat would cool down. She had died.  
  
A large hand caressed softly her forehead and closed her eyelids with extreme tenderness.  
  
"No. No free. Never free" Warren denied savagely, grimly. Inwardly another piece of him had wilted and died. Then he allowed himself mourning and grieving. His body shook compulsorily, rage and sorrow overtaking his mind. His wings unfolded rose behind him as two looming judges flanking him. "There always is a prize. And Apocalypse will pay dearly."  
  
"Interesting theory. Therefore what would be your payment, Warren?"  
  
The sudden voice started him, but the winged mutant didn't show outward signs of it. He remained quiet, kneeled on the floor and leaned onward. A slender shadow stalked towards him.  
  
Something long and sharp and glowing laid on his shoulder, grazing slightly his neck. Smoldering eyes glared him from behind. He didn't turn around.  
  
"Well? What do you think that must be your deserved reward?"  
  
The tone was more biting than the sword resting along his neck. "I... It was my fault you were arrested by them. You went in the citadel to see me and exchange information, and they caught you. And I didn't help you despite of our deal. I'm too coward, always standing in the sidelines to stay alive."  
  
"Yes, but watching your subordinate here, I shouldn't feel me singled out. You kept barely afloat, but although you didn't sink, didn't reach the shore either. Answer my question, Warren."  
  
"My prize was seeing my friends dead cause of my inaction. And... Do whatever you want, Betsy."  
  
A heavy sigh. The pressure upon his shoulder loosened.  
  
"The soul is the core of a person, Warren. My power enables me see them and destroy them. Nevertheless how can I destroy a soul when there's nothing left of it? You sold yours long ago. And there isn't anything worse than that. I'm not going to do anything, Warren. You committed my revenge on my behalf." She stepped around and crouched in front of him. A hand stroked softly his cheek. Warren blinked with that unexpected gentleness. "Clueless fool. You believed you could remain neutral, cutting yourself off your humanity, and ignoring what was happening around, didn't you? You committed a major mistake. You don't posses the required temper, cold and ruthless. You cared for things, persons. And now they're gone forever, and you can't go back. You have drowned at last."  
  
Warren looked away. His face darkened, his expression downcast. Betsy knew she couldn't be really angry. He tormented rather on his own. It would be tantamount to pour a water bucket in a lake.  
  
"Still I can do a last thing." He whispered darkly. That raspy, throaty tone would bring about shudders upon who regarded him like a coward. "Apocalypse considers he's safe. After all, nobody can touch him in the sanctity of his stronghold. I'd love prove him how wrong he's in that matter particular. And in everything in general."  
  
A dagger-like blaze flared on the Psylocke's backhand, and she gazed the jagged edge quietly. The purple, sparkling glow cast a very eerie light on his gorgeous face, inexpressive as a stone, and she let it danced ghostly on his unreadable features. "It sounds as a plan to me."  
  
A sudden updraft whipped her with unexpected violence, threatening drag her. Betsy flinched and clung more tightly to her carrier. The winds howling and rushing across those heights were wild tentacles of hurricane, shifting, twisting and whirling continuously. She was winded and frozen with that blood-chilling gale, but she didn't relinquish her hold, self-conscious of the distance separating her from the ground. Fortunately she had spent in the air the most part of the time since this final craziness began, and she had got used to the finer points of riding on a flying object.  
  
Besides, her current vehicle maneuvered with a lightness and dexterity utterly fabulous, skimming over the Tower with swift aerial loops. The way he glided among different drafts and sailed easily on whirlwinds matched a dolphin underwater. His feathers ruffled and twitched with each gust, and she supposed his wings felt the way the wind shifted, since he rotated and twisted even before a swirl blew.  
  
How he could maneuver like that dragging so much weight was beyond her. Betsy had sat astride on his back, and between her hands there was a knot linking two ropes tied around each wing. Several black packs were attached firmly to them. At the very least they should unbalance him, but...  
  
"We've reached the border of the shield!" He screamed louder than the wind. "You can let go the bombs!"  
  
"Right away!" She replied. Wrapping more tightly her pretty legs around his torso, she loosened the knot. Angel swooped over the curvy surface of the shield, and she released the ropes, shoving the weights downwards.  
  
"No, wait-"  
  
The alarmed warning came too late. With a lurch, the square bulges plummeted down as a waterfall of boulders. Abruptly a brusque and cold gale snatched them and rushed them upwards, at the barrier's peak, dangerously proximate to Angel and Psylocke.  
  
Betsy gulped in fear, realizing of the bombs would burst too near from them because of that shift. She covered her face helplessly with the hands, and her sheer instinct raised a telekinetic shield, knowing it would be too meager and weak to shelter them from the explosives.  
  
A roaring boom. Charring fire. Blistering heat. Blinding red light. A shockwave burst, spreading outwards, as far as the eyesight reached.  
  
Betsy felt her ride wobbling up and down, while the heat whipped them and light hurt her eyes. However she didn't sense to both catapulted backwards, either flames searing her flesh and cooking it in a blackened charcoal.  
  
She risked a peek among her fingers, and gasped. Her breath caught on her windpipe, she contemplated the last remnants of the barrier flickering and dissolving while Warren and herself remained untouched and unscathed.  
  
But how? The defensive field was assembled to withstand a bombardment. Anything enough powerful to breach that shield was bound to tear in shreds any puny force barrier she was able of making.  
  
A shadow, a blur of speed rushed past them. Betsy gasped in recognition of that silhouette.  
  
I'm sorry, lady, but this is up to me She sensed that firm and reassuring voice intruding in her thoughts and jerked her head in acknowledgment. He had to have tugged them backwards and enveloped in a telekinetic cocoon, protecting them from the explosion.  
  
"What in the Hell was that?" The startled and wheezing Warren's voice returned her to the reality. Betsy stalled while she dwelt on the situation. A new idea floated in her mind...  
  
"Betsy, are you listening to me?" Warren called, confused. Why she had spaced out for seconds? "I was asking what we'll do now. Attack to Apocalypse openly or-?"  
  
Betsy shook her head, denying that option. "No. I've thought of a better idea. Please, lead us towards that glass dome beneath us. I've got the premonition of our powers can be more effective over there."  
  
Warren shrugged, and with a twitch of his wings he dashed downwards.  
  
Rogue and her team stormed violently in the Tower's upper levels, battling against herds of soldiers each step of the way. After a long struggle, ascending a way spiraled upwards as a corkscrew, letting a trail of blood in their wake, they had reached her final destination. The X-Men stopped a few seconds to regain the breath and quiet down the thumping of their hearts. And just then was when they realized of the maelstrom hanging over theirs heads.  
  
They were unsure of what thinking when Worthington shattered the dome of stained glasses framed by thick iron rafts, and landed into the chamber with a light flapping of his shimmering wings, carrying in his arms to Psylocke. A hail of shards dropped around, but he seemed unbothered for it.  
  
The entire crowd started to whisper at each other questions about the Angel and his presence here and now. But in a normal, conversational and audible tone. They didn't give them really a damn if Worthington heard them or not, and certainly they'd often voiced and thrown personal opinions on his face. And Warren had hardly cared for what they said.  
  
Rogue, being more direct, looked questioningly at Betsy, projecting mentally her questions.  
  
Psylocke dismounted neatly off her personal Angel, and straightened to gaze at the leader with icy-blue eyes. "I've returned to America to warn you of the plans of the Council. We're in danger, although I can realize it's a pointless understatement actually."  
  
"And him?"  
  
She shook her head. "Look, it isn't important. He can help us now."  
  
A contemptuous, derisive snort. Nightcrawler. Grimacing with spite plain on his darkened face. "What do you make think, Psylocke, we need, want or shall accept his help?"  
  
Warren pinned on him a heated glare. "As much as I need, want or am interested in your appreciation, Kurt Wagner, I'm in no mood to deal with you. I've got a very bad day, and I'm not willing put up with you puny self-righteousness. All I want is stab at least once to Apocalypse before dying. So put your hypocrisy where the sun doesn't shine."  
  
Nightcrawler narrowed dangerously his eyes, and his rapiers were unsheathed with a grating of steel against steel. Warren held his leer unyieldingly, and the situation could have degenerated quickly if Betsy hadn't jumped in between, putting up her hands in gesture of peace, but clenching a fist meaningfully.  
  
"It's enough, both of you! We're at the end of the world and you can only argue!" She growled. "Warren, control your temper. Kurt, forget your pride. Apocalypse has found out Warren had been passing information to the Human Council, and several of his workers are jailed or dead. He has no reason to conserve his neutrality, and no desire of aligning himself with Nur. Armageddon is knocking on our door and we can't turn down allies out of arrogance, principle or disdain."  
  
Silence answered her whole-hearted speech. Then the X-Men nodded slowly.  
  
They could harbor doubts or reluctance, but they admitted grudgingly that she was right. However, that strained and uneasy pause came to an abrupt end when the roof arched above their heads exploded in a cloud of debris and iron rust, letting way to two figures fell down through the new gap. Their limbs were tightly entangled as they rotated in midair, wrestling unceasingly with unknown frenzy and fury. One of them was an unfamiliar boy. The other was the fearsome, golden beetle-like shape of Holocaust.  
  
Thoroughly startled, Rogue took off, intending breaking up a fight she believed unbalanced and unfair, when a voice halted her on her tracks. A sweet, warm voice. Her heart nearly stopped beating.  
  
"Your intervention is unnecessary, my beloved. Observe carefully."  
  
Her head jerked around, staring longingly at the figure matching that tone. His eyes seemed haggard and his face a mess under the helmet's shadows, and she guessed his nose was broken and bleeding. His red and purple outfit was gone, substituted by black and fitting drags whose many tears hinted the wounds, lumps and scars zigzagging along his skin, as plow-made trenches. They had beaten him, smashed, flayed and bled, trying breaking his body to shatter his spirit. But he had finally won.  
  
She had felt nearly dying when Holocaust gloated foolishly over his capture, but she needed being strong for him and their son, bottling up the inner anguish gnawing her, festering in her despair. And now she was seeing him, injured but alive... Elation overwhelmed her, and she prayed in thanks for first time in a long time.  
  
She wanted to hug him, kiss him and sob on his shoulder. But this was an emergency. She cast a longing, loving smile at him and turned to both combatants, ready for saving the boy.  
  
Her eyelids fluttered briskly, and her ogling eyes stared stunned the scene.  
  
"Conceited kid!" The golden-armored warrior roared, jabbing brutally the Nathan's underbelly, emptying air out of his lungs. "What does you make think you are worthy of battling to my father?"  
  
Nate disregarded his winded breath, and grabbed the exposed arm. With a swift and fluid circular motion, he heaved to Holocaust and threw him in the nearest wall. He was reeling still when Nate raised an arm. Brightness sizzled on his open palm, and one hundred energy spears stabbed and pierced his enemy. His golden armor was now cracked in a cobweb of tiny shatters and fissures. Flames poured out of them.  
  
Before fainting in oblivion, Holocaust felt something heavy and oppressive and choking sitting on his chest and crushing it under its weight. It was the sheer, raw and undiluted hatred and loathing of the boy. A bonfire of bare rage produced ripples on the atmosphere around his leather-dressed body.  
  
"Let's say I'm very well recommended." He growled, clenching spasmodically one fist. "Thanks for the warm-up, but it's time of going for the main dish. Loser."  
  
He smirked faintly, and his glowing gaze swiveled briefly to Magneto. He bellowed. "Aren't you done yet, Magneto? We have a bastard to cream!"  
  
"Wait, Nate" Magneto voiced back. "Give me one minute to organize my troops. And please, don't trying attacking on your own. We need working together and coordinate our efforts to triumph." Erik waited, hesitantly, until Nate moved up and down his head. Reassured of the boy wouldn't try anything stupid, he clasped her wife's hand with his fingers, and both floated down at the ground, where the X-Men were awaiting him anxiously.  
  
He looked over the crowd, and his gaze shifted of pleased seeing to Illyana and Destine, to curious and somewhat troubled when he saw to Psylocke.  
  
"Greetings, my X-Men. Before telling our next movement, I think I'm lacking of important pieces of information. What has happened in Eurasia, Elisabeth, to prompt the Council to bomb us? And where's Logan?"  
  
Psylocke sighed. "We're running out of time, so I'll do it quick."  
  
Her eyelids closed, as shutters insulating her from the physical world, and her mind hurled purple tendrils of energy that latched around each brain surrounding her, forging a link. Information rushed along the ties, as blood welling up along veins, and memories were shared.  
  
Warren gasped, amazed, at the secret, crazy and desperate plot of the X-Men. The X-Men gasped, puzzled, in his dealings with the Eurasian. Betsy found out about the exploits of her friends in America, and they gaped with disbelief and dread at the Council plans and the Weapon-X role in them. Magneto saw to Summers and Jean beating the Elite and breaking free the prisoners and regretted not having planned something like that in advance. Everyone saw some scattered pieces, fragments, shards of the Bishop remembrances, glitches of a world weird but still more logical and brighter than theirs own, and each one drew their own conclusions.  
  
Some things were left unsaid, or were censored by Psylocke. After all, there were things better left unsaid, she thought.  
Nonetheless, Magneto took his own decision.  
  
The Glass was sparkling and shining, like beckoning them. Or pleading them.  
  
"I must acknowledge I wasn't expecting this" Jean mused fearfully, as her feet avoided stepping on loose stones.  
  
In front of them, carved and holed in the innards of the ground, there was a giant amphitheater of rock, built through the years with much effort and sacrifice. Years of drilling the hardest stone as moles, of transporting blocks and boulders and chiseling them in tiles, bricks and ashlars, of turning lightless burrows in human dwellings... all that weight of blood and sweat and tears gleamed on each place where she laid her eyes on. This was the core of the Morlock galleries' network, with tunnels spreading for miles and miles.  
  
But the structure was collapsed, perhaps by an earthquake, and now the bottom was a sea of dirt and debris with columns and rafts sticking out, and the arched galleries were crumbled and blocked with bricks and boulders. Jean felt a stark desolation gripping her with shivering fear as she observed the devastated remains of the hall, ever keeping a watchful eye on the fragile ceiling -each droplet dripping or dust film filtering started her-. She was watching her hopes of salvation shattered. The tunnels were their best escape route and now... They had never any chance.  
  
"I'm not giving up." Scott stated harshly and savagely by her side. She glanced sideways at him, dumbfounded. Had she been leaking out? "Your telekinesis can sweep out of the way the largest boulders, and my beams can dig a way. I promised save this people and I'll do it or die trying it. And I'm not ready to die yet, so I've no choice but doing it."  
  
"But the bombs-" She stammered hesitantly, recalling the nukes Psylocke had talked about.  
  
"This site is deeper than an antinuclear shelter. And although the roof is very unstable, I'm counting in your telekinesis if it falls in due to the explosions."  
  
Jean blinked, perplexed, and a warm smile split slowly her face. He could become the most anguished and saddest man on the world, but when he was determined to do something, NOTHING could sway him away his goal. He never surrendered, whatever were the odds. Moreover, when he was in danger his mind turned sharper, swifter, brighter. It was a one of the traits she sincerely admired and envied on him.  
  
She was about of grinning and nodding resolutely, with renewed faith, when something flickered among the multitude, stirring her instincts in wakefulness.  
  
Golden ripples of heat enveloped her, slamming her into a wall. Searing fire singed her uniform and licked her skin, and she shrieked painfully. Pointed pebbles hurt her side, where the burn itched unbearably. Blackness crept on the edges of her vision, clouded with moistness, as Scott rushed by her side frantically.  
  
"Jean!" He cried desperately, kneeling, holding her hand, pleading her with his grief-stricken face. His reddened eyesight swiveled then to the crowd. "You!"  
  
His voice was so overflowed, so laden with bare rage and hatred that she thanked no seeing what look glowed on his eyes. Her mind barely coped with the tempest of fury he was blistering with.  
  
The formerly ordered rows of moaning and suffering prisoners were now a mayhem of people scattering and running aimlessly among screams, as a lonely figure stood out on the chaos. A tall and haughty person, darkened in concealing shadows, draped with a tattered cloak billowed on a blizzard of energy gathering. His clenched fists simmered with power begging being unleashed, and flares of light pouring out of his eyes lighted up the inside of his cowl. Jean berated to herself unceasingly for no having sensed him in time, and grimaced with the feeling of deadly hostility flowing from him and washing in waves over her.  
  
A pang of hurt stabbed her, and she moaned piercingly. She felt the Scott's agitation, his concern for her, and a surge of loath matched his brother's for once.  
  
"Did you seriously think I'd let you run away cheerfully to live happily ever after?" Havok growled with barely restrained fury. His hands were twitching, and the plasma was burning the air. An acrid and foul stench pervaded the tunnel. "I don't care what else happens, I don't care if the Apocalypse's reign falls today! You're dead."  
  
That final statement sounded so hoarse and bleak and dead Jean felt chills.  
  
On the surface, as the looming bombers soared over the city, and bombs began to drop, dissolving skyscrapers in ashes and people in charred charcoal, the hairy and short man had brought that destruction, wandered around, trying sensing a last hanging thread of a long-time dead link. He ignored the blinding light, the burning fire, the unholy shrieks, the stench to cooked flesh. He was ready to die for his sins, but he needed seeing her a last time to rest in peace.  
  
Suddenly, he felt it. Some last strand of the link or pure instincts, he didn't know. But he felt something bad had happened to Jean. She was in hurt. In great hurt and in big danger.  
  
"Jeannie" Weapon-X muttered. For first time in his lifetime, he felt fear.  
  
A brutal explosion vibrated behind him. A burst of bright radiance and crackling electricity blinded him, before the ear-shattering noise and the wave of choking smoke enveloped him.  
  
Apocalypse moved his body mass slowly, whirling around to face the figure of Magneto, standing alone in the gap of what once was a bulwark. A blue-grey nimbus of crispy energy surrounded him, as a cobalt nebula enveloping a black star. On the ground laid remnants of boulders and iron beams twisted and ripped off violently, blackened and shredded by an incredible strength.  
  
"You have returned. And I considering you a coward" His voice rumbled nonchalantly.  
  
"No, I'm the same like you. A genius. The fittest's survival." Magneto spat the word with acid scorn, like if it was viper's poison. With a lift of his hands metal plates and wires stirred and floated around him, as an asteroid belt. "You behave like if you were the first tyrant in discovering the concept and chancing the world's fate with that absurdity! When I was a child I heard that same sentence on the lips of a Viennese sign painter! A madman whom race tried finishing off with everything they considered filthy and impure!"  
  
Steel warped and shifted, as fluid in his hands as water, and the alloys coiled and blended around his frame forging a red armor, very thick but light and very resistant. It fitted him as a second skin. "And do you remember who won the war he began? The weak ones who rose in indignant triumph to overthrow once and for all to the strong ones!"  
  
Driven by fury beyond description, an unquenchable rage born of years of suffering, Erik streaked onwards, and before Apocalypse was able of reacting, his armored fist connected a crushing strike on his stony face, a crunching hit sent him sprawling backwards, his brain reeling inside his skull.  
  
Apocalypse stumbled on the floor, but he was back on his feet before Erik was able of blinking. He looked up, and his murky grimace twisted in a grin. It wasn't a pleasant sight, and Magneto followed those lifeless eyes were as looking in a deep. And his pupils widened. Fear constricted his chest.  
  
His little baby boy, in hands of Guido Carosella? Betray them -and the world- once wasn't enough to him?  
  
"Were you telling anything, Magneto?" Apocalypse stated laconically. His booming laughter followed on.  
  
And it was drowned by the sharp Guido's cry, a shriek of someone who is being turned inside out. His body gave off golden light that flowed in wisps upwards, as if it was being sucked in a vortex. Feeling his strength abandoning him, and his body changing in a blob of flesh his skeleton couldn't support, he kneeled. Behind him stood Rogue, clutching one merciless hand around his bald crown.  
  
"I think Pocket-Lips was asking you a fair question, sugar. You should answer him" Angrily she wrenched her boy out of the trunk-like Guido's arms, now fragile as twigs. "Or even better, ask him why the omnipotent and immortal High Lord never agrees to a fair fight with you. Ask him why The One Will Survive needs always hostages. Ask him why The Strong One uses helpless kids to fight in his place!"  
  
Rogue became more incensed with each word, and she remarked her last statement punching to Strong Guy, a hit hurled him through the opposite wall and catapulted him outside of The Tower. She didn't hear his prolonged scream as his body plummeted down in the void.  
  
"Mom, why is daddy fighting?" Her son asked, seeing his father and Magneto exchanging brutal, crushing blows. She looked down to Charles, feeling suddenly very tired. She had stored her ire, pain, sorrow and hatred in that strike, unleashing her repressed feelings on Guido, and now that surge driving her had worn off, she sensed tiredness and elation.  
  
"For us, my son. For all of us."  
  
This fight was one of the most ferocious he could recall ever, Scott reflected disgustedly, as his head ducked, avoiding a blow fractured a concrete brick as sandstone. He reciprocated with a knee on the stomach gave him an opening to an uppercut on the jaw.  
  
Alex emptied his lungs with other most powerful punch and Scott noted the stakes hadn't ever been so high on other fights either. Ignoring his oxygen lacking, he shoved his brother away with a double palm blow.  
  
Alex staggered backwards until he fixed firmly his feet on the floor. He stepped forward, crunching little pebbles under his boots, and crouched as a feline. "At last, brother. Now, by the First Law, the Fittest's Survival, one of we must die. And like our powers nullify mutually, it'll be pretty funnier."  
  
Alex lunged towards him, trying a ram, but Scott crouched down and planted solidly his boots. When his brother collided with him, Scott blocked it and immobilized him.  
  
We're about of dying and the only thing he cares for is proving he's best, Scott pondered sadly. Why is he so driven and obsessed? How have we come to this? "It hasn't to be like this, Alex."  
  
"Yes, it does. I wish you hadn't been born." Alex grunted, trying breaking the hold.  
  
Scott sighed, fed-up, with a long-suffering face. "Yes, I know. I've been listening that phrase ever since I was four. Assume it already!"  
  
Scott arched backwards his right fist, and with a staggering blow, hurled to Alex newly on the wall. His brother wobbled unsteadily as he tried standing up, but Scott swept his ankles off the floor with a roundhouse kick. Alex dropped violently, but he instantly cartwheeled away Scott. Once he was far from him, he straightened slowly. His stance was a tad groggy and slumped due to the hits.  
  
Scott advanced slowly, looming over him, thinking already in ending this bout. "Give up, Alex. You have never beaten me in a fair fight. Never since we were children. Besides, this is pointless. Jean can't protect us of the bombardment thanks to you. Apparently we'll only be together in the death."  
  
And Scott rushed towards him, ready to give the final blow. But Alex quickly sleeved up his outfit, showing a new-brand bracelet-like gadget, and pressed a button on it. The Scott's instincts screamed, and he willed sidestep, but he was too near, and in midair.  
  
"Not even, Judas!" His brother screamed, shooting a stream of power, a discharge of ivory energy instead golden plasma. The blast struck head-on to Scott, taking him down. And he cried, for first time in his lifetime feeling his sibling's power harming him.  
  
Alex rose up fully, staring at his brother sprawled down, with the molten gear and singed outfit showing his skin scorched, and smirked. An ugly and murky smile of satisfaction.  
  
"At last!" He guffawed noisily "Since I've got memory, you've always got everything. But this victory is mine!"  
  
"Then enjoy it. You have little time left." A grating voice sounded harshly behind him, cutting off his speech. Abruptly started, Alex whirled to face his owner, but he merely saw a glimpse of blackness before a rain of punches pummeled his body. He was still reeling, almost knocked out, when two hands grabbed fistfuls of his cape, hauled him, and with an incredible strength tossed him towards the wall.  
  
Pain, flaring pain drilled his body, and his lips emitted a blood-curdling cry. Craning downwards his still neck with difficult, he glanced the jagged edge of a girder sticking out of his chest. Blood was welling out of the gruesome wound, staining his lower clothes with crimson. The image blurred and turned dimmer, and he screwed up his eyes. Besides of the blood loss, a vital organ had to be punctured or downright shredded.  
  
He stared upwards, and despite of the red blotches dotting his vision, his eyes recognized numbly the figure striding sternly towards him. A midnight-black suit hid fully his body, no bulky but perfectly built and muscled. On that pitched blackness was drawn a bright-white spider, as well as two choleric and blank eyes on the mask. He was a Resistance member. One of the most vicious and most bloodthirsty. He was no mutant, but no Prelate had defeated him ever.  
  
"This is for my Betty, bastard." He whispered with a dangerously low voice, before smashing brutally his face with a fist. Darkness enveloped to Alex.  
  
Peter Parker watched his loathed enemy's head dangling limply, without feeling the slightest regret. Once upon a time, his own coldness had frightened him. Without dwelling on what war and loss and heartbreaking had changed him into, he spun around to face the man and the woman fallen. They'd been the best undercover allies of the Resistance. If he would have got here earlier...  
  
Something cracked the ice beneath the mask, and he sobbed bitterly.  
  
Air shifted and moaned and trembled, overloaded with crackling energy discharges and psionic spears slashing the space and exploding on the impact. Magneto and Nathan were unleashing their full powers on Apocalypse, hurling wave after wave of attacks. The exertion and the strain of using such energies with such potency without rest was utterly ignored when they saw their target backing down, unable of advancing down that raging storm.  
  
"Come on, Nathan! Hit him with everything you get! Don't give him the slightest chance!" Magneto encouraged to his young ally, as he flung a tide of electromagnetic radiance.  
  
"Slim chance of that, old man- Agggh!"  
  
A screech of pain erupted out of his mouth, and Nate staggered forward. His fingers gripped his side as a vice, and he tilted his head backwards. Holocaust was towering over him, having just fired a barrage of blazes on his back.  
  
"Very well, little brat. Now we shall battle until the end. Is it clear?" The Horseman roared, without hiding the resentment throbbing underneath the anger on his voice. His former humiliation was eating him alive.  
  
"Crystal" Nate growled, and no wanting wasting time with him, lunged on Holocaust, brandishing the handiest weapon he got. The shard had stolen from Apocalypse minutes ago. The tiny glass sliced the thick armor as a knife the hot butter, and stabbed the monster's bowels. The Holocaust's screech was drowned down by the roaring of flares of iris energy seeped and streamed violently out of the glass, enveloping whoever was touching it.  
  
And Holocaust and Nate simply vanished, like if the ground had split and swallowed both.  
  
Erik wanted shouting in shocked fear, but Apocalypse was suddenly on him, circling his fragile neck with his bare broad hands, trying throttling him with frenzy. His knuckles were whitened with the effort.  
  
Magneto wasn't sure of what emotion warped his ugly face. It might be mirth, fury or the frustration of seeing his plans shattered and swept by the fate. He didn't pay it attention, such like he didn't listen to his last taunts, mockeries to prod him to fight. Instead of that he took advantage of his proximity, and focused his power on his armor.  
  
When sounded the first creak of the cracks fracturing his armor and spreading as a cobweb, Apocalypse had to have understood what was happening, because his face blanched, drained from color, and his claws loosened the vice grip. It was the first time Magneto had seen such fear on that face usually oozed evil. And the last time, because he whipped his arms backwards, and with a sickening noise of metal crunching and flesh rending, he split to Apocalypse in two halves.  
  
En Sabah Nur had time to barely scream.  
  
And then he was atop of his battered form, lighting up his bloodied and torn face with the blue flames crackling and dancing around his fists.  
  
"You have been twenty years telling only survive the strong ones. Tell me it again, Apocalypse. Tell me how much strong and powerful and fit you are." He brought forward his fists as Apocalypse agonized, spitting blood amidst gurgles. Erik spun around, grossed by the picture, and stalked off, away of the corpse.  
  
Mines were already exploding around, incinerating and razing his world to cinders, and the last thing his eyes wanted gazing at wasn't the Apocalypse's head, muddled with dirt and blood.  
  
"We were the mightiest from our race, Apocalypse. Imagine what we had been on the same side. What world it might have been."  
  
He needed meet with his wife and his son.  
  
When he speared the Holocaust's underbelly with the glass, Nate was stunned from the reaction what he got. Perhaps was a chemical reaction to the Holocaust flares, perhaps to his psychic powers. Perhaps, only perhaps, destine. He didn't know. But suddenly he was in nowhere, and Holocaust, Magneto, Apocalypse, the Tower, had disappeared.  
  
Now he was submerged into a ruby-red ocean, although he wasn't drowning. Only there was light everywhere, surrounding him. And despite of he was quiet his body was drifting slowly towards someplace. Maybe he was floating at the surface, although he saw no limits or borders. He did no motion to rush it. He should feel fear, but he only felt comfort and peace instead. Like if in somewhere of his mind he was aware of the war had ended.  
  
Still he held a regret. Nate mourned not having known his parents. What would they think about him? They were good people? Or only two specimens Sinister exploited while he needed and after discarded quickly?  
  
He closed his eyes, grieving for the lost chances. Then he reached for last time towards the mind of the woman he felt closest to himself. The person he knew was his mother. The link crossed the threshold between dimensions and touched her, hooking to her as he escaped out of that doomed world.  
  
In the reality, Jean Grey was fainted, wheezing laboriously as Death approached to embrace her. Then her mind felt a presence clinging to her, dragging her. That force found an obstacle, though, and struggled against the power anchoring her. They wrestled and yanked, and excruciating pain stabbed her, as if her body was being cut asunder. Agonizingly, she latched on Scott, her mind clinging to his brain in turn. But then he was dragged too.  
  
The Black Spider gasped in amazement when he saw to Summers and Grey writhing and stirring, like if they were in intense hurt, and the air humming and wavering, as if a sheen of hot vapor was floating. Then, with a screeching noise and a quake, a tear opened in midair, as a gash in the fabric of the reality. Summers and Grey were sucked in the hole with a strength defied description.  
  
He ignored how he knew, but he intuited they were now safe and sound.  
  
It was his last thought before the ceiling fell in, and blinding-ivory clarity flooded the world.  
  
End of Part Six  
  
I don't want this being the end, in fact. How I said, I intended continuing telling the Summers family's adventures in Earth 616 -Can a single timeline bear TWO Summers families?- but it can be a while. Please, tell me what you thought or what you would like seeing. 


End file.
